Parental Involvement In School: Research Says Teens With Involved Parents Learn Better

As kids get older and advance to high school, talking to them about their school life can become more difficult for parents. With younger children, parents may have been required to sign off on report cards and progress reports, attend more parent-teacher conferences, or simply drive their kids to school. But when students reach high school, connecting with children over school can become challenging.

Even if parent engagement in academics is hard, it's incredibly important, says Sherri Wilson, senior manager of family engagement at the National Parent Teacher Association (PTA). Wilson helped organize the recent National Take Your Family to School Week, designed to build partnerships between families and schools through individual school events such as teacher-parent breakfasts, game nights, and workshops for applying to college.

Wilson cites a report from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) that surveyed the same 25,000 students, once in eighth grade, again in 10th, and lastly in 12th. The students' responses—along with surveys of their parents and educators, and academic data -- showed that parental involvement in school correlates with higher grade point averages.

The most important way for family members to get involved is to show interest in the student's academics at home, says Wilson.

"Unfortunately [engagement] often tapers off as children get older," she says. So, parents and other family members who care for students should be "making sure their children are taking the right classes and maintaining passing grades."

Wilson also says parents should be working with their high school kids on pre-college activities, such as filling out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). "It's about making sure that their child is going to be able to leave high school and go to college or start a career," she says.

For students who could become the first in their family to seek higher education, Wilson says, "Having an expectation that their child should go to college will have a profound shift for them."

While offering support and guidance at home is the first step in engaging in a high school student's academics, it's certainly not the last. Families should work with the school, too, specifically by communicating with teachers and giving them helpful background information on their children, Wilson says.

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Usually, she adds, the parents and high school teachers are on the same team in that they both want the child to succeed.

"It really needs to be a partnership between the school and the parents," Wilson says. They should "build trusting and respectful relationships."

Comments

[CASAFamilyDay]

03:35 PM on 02/27/2012

Good article. Our research shows that the more often parents connect with their kids around the dinner table, the more likely their kids are to have better grades, have better self-esteem and have better relationships with their parents. Those kids are also less likely to drink, smoke or use drugs. Everyone wins when families spend time together! http://www.casafamilyday.org/

[J R M]

03:36 PM on 02/21/2012

By age 14, youth are increasingly working under their own power. Parents need to have done their work right by then. But even at 14 and above, parents can make sure that students realize that their studies are paramount and help structure there lives so that they can accomplish what they need to do.

So yes, having focused and supportive parents is important to students. How could it be otherwise?

[sherriwilson]

01:48 PM on 02/21/2012

Family engagement is a critical factor in student academic achievement. Even something as simple as promoting values, goals, expectations, and aspirations at home can make a significant difference in influencing a child's learning.

[Parents Step Ahead]

05:33 PM on 02/20/2012

Thank you so much for shedding some light on the importance of getting parents involved and providing them the tools to help their children succeed. Parents Step Ahead (Padres un Paso Adelante) is a nonprofit organizati­on in North Texas dedicated to educating, enabling and empowering parents to take a proactive role in the educationa­l and personal developmen­t of their children. We work in partnershi­p with school districts, corporatio­ns and community organizati­ons to offer a series of school-bas­ed programs for parents, all of which are done both in Spanish and English. Programs are free and include dinner, childcare, community resource fair and the raffle of prizes. Also, about 80% of parents that attend our programs do not have a computer at home so we try our best to bridge the technologi­cal gap by raffling a new desktop computer at each of our parent programs.

For the past six years we have worked to provide parents, of all background­s, the indispensa­ble educationa­l tools they need to overcome barriers and help their families succeed. Through our programs and initiative­s, we have reached more than 20,000 parents among 45 schools in the North Texas area. Our website, http://www­.parentsst­epahead.or­g, has more informatio­n or feel free to contact us at [phone].