Parental Involvement in Education - Essay Example

The question is not whether parental involvement is a benefit to a student's educational experience as previous studies have often indicated. The measure of parental involvement is not the time spent or the test scores of the student, but is contextual to the student, the parents, and the school environment. The question is important primarily for parents to measure and assess their activity in relation to their child's school environment. The parent who spends additional time working with the student's homework or participating in school activities may be spending time that is counterproductive to their goal.

Homework may prove to be frustrating for the parent. The student may resent the parent's intrusion into what they perceive as their private life. Parents require a measure of what parental involvement is beneficial and what aspect of it may be detrimental. Parental involvement in education needs to be viewed from the various aspects of age, motivation, and pattern of involvement. Crosnoe (2001) studied 692 freshmen and sophomore students of a mixed and diverse ethnic population (p. 214). The study was conducted by questionnaire by inquiring about the amount of time spent with the parents on homework and the parent's involvement with school activities (pp. 215-216). Crosnoe (2001) found that college preparatory students experienced an initially high amount of parental involvement, but was diminished as they progressed in school (p. 221). Crosnoe (2001) further noted that general and remedial students had a level of parental involvement that stabilized or increased over time (p. 221) This confirms the findings of Watkins (1997) when he reports, "Parents in this study were more likely to be involved when their children displayed low achievement".

Parental involvement may be out of necessity to correct problems rather than an indicator of positive reinforcement for the student.The Watkins (1997) study was conducted on a group of 303 students with a racial mix of 64% white and 33% black. The parents were above average educated with 43% having at least a two-year degree. Watkins (1997) observed that there were patterns of involvement that differentiated the student's achievement. Watkins (1997) contends that parents become involved for one of four reasons.

Involvement may be at the request of the teacher or due to low grades. They may also become involved because they want to raise the child's grades or they feel they are more equipped than other parents to elevate the child's learning. Watkins (1997) noted this effect was highest among minority parents and well educated whites. Similar to Watkin's (1997) findings were the results of a study by Domina (2005) The Domina (2005) study found that, "[.] after school and family background and child's prior academic achievement are controlled, the effect of each of these involvement activities on children's academic achievement is negative or nonsignificant (p. 245). The effect of the parental background also is highlighted in the Van Voorhis (2003) study evaluated middle school students to evaluate parental involvement effect on science students.

The study examined the effect of parental help with homework. Van Voorhis (2003) found many negative effects of parental involvement (p.325). Parents may become frustrated or supply inappropriate