“Parent Involvement” can take many directions. Do we teach our children to be autonomous or do we ostensibly “help” them? “Too much is never enough” has become an American tradition. Too much love, too much guidance…are we hurting our children? Researchers have studied this question and ask us to consider our own parent-child relations. Have we relied on conventional wisdom and/or misconceptions? Might it be that…
Parental Involvement Is Overrated
Most people, asked whether parental involvement benefits children academically, would say, “of course it does.” But evidence from our research suggests otherwise. In fact, most forms of parental involvement, like observing a child’s class, contacting a school about a child’s behavior, helping to decide a child’s high school courses, or helping a child with homework, do not improve student achievement. In some cases, they actually hinder it.
Over the past few years, we conducted an extensive study of whether the depth of parental engagement in children’s academic lives improved their test scores and grades. We pursued this question because we noticed that while policy makers were convinced that parental involvement positively affected children’s schooling outcomes, academic studies were much more inconclusive.
Despite this, increasing parental involvement has been one of the focal points of both President George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind Act and President Obama’s Race to the Top. Both programs promote parental engagement as one remedy for persistent socioeconomic and racial achievement gaps.
We analyzed longitudinal surveys of American families that spanned three decades (from the 1980s to the 2000s) and obtained demographic information on race and ethnicity, socioeconomic status, the academic outcomes of children in elementary, middle and high school, as well as information about the level of parental engagement in 63 different forms.
What did we find? One group of parents, including blacks and Hispanics, as well as some Asians (like Cambodians, Vietnamese and Pacific Islanders), appeared quite similar to a second group, made up of white parents and other Asians (like Chinese, Koreans and Indians) in the frequency of their involvement. A common reason given for why the children of the first group performed worse academically on average was that their parents did not value education to the same extent. But our research shows that these parents tried to help their children in school just as much as the parents in the second group.
Even the notion that kids do better in school when their parents are involved does not stack up. After comparing the average achievement of children whose parents regularly engage in each form of parental involvement to that of their counterparts whose parents do not, we found that most forms of parental involvement yielded no benefit to children’s test scores or grades, regardless of racial or ethnic background or socioeconomic standing.
In fact, there were more instances in which children had higher levels of achievement when their parents were less involved than there were among those whose parents were more involved. Even more counterintuitively: When involvement does seem to matter, the consequences for children’s achievement are more often negative than positive.
When involvement did benefit kids academically, it depended on which behavior parents were engaging in, which academic outcome was examined, the grade level of the child, the racial and ethnic background of the family and its socioeconomic standing. For example, regularly discussing school experiences with your child seems to positively affect the reading and math test scores of Hispanic children, to negatively affect test scores in reading for black children, and to negatively affect test scores in both reading and math for white children (but only during elementary school). Regularly reading to elementary school children appears to benefit reading achievement for white and Hispanic children but it is associated with lower reading achievement for black children. Policy makers should not advocate a one-size-fits-all model of parental involvement.
What about when parents work directly with their children on learning activities at home? When we examined whether regular help with homework had a positive impact on children’s academic performance, we were quite startled by what we found. Regardless of a family’s social class, racial or ethnic background, or a child’s grade level, consistent homework help almost never improved test scores or grades. Most parents appear to be ineffective at helping their children with homework. Even more surprising to us was that when parents regularly helped with homework, kids usually performed worse. One interesting exception: The group of Asians that included Chinese, Korean and Indian children appeared to benefit from regular help with homework, but this benefit was limited to the grades they got during adolescence; it did not affect their test scores.
Our findings also suggest that the idea that parental involvement will address one of the most salient and intractable issues in education, racial and ethnic achievement gaps, is not supported by the evidence. This is because our analyses show that most parental behavior has no benefit on academic performance. While there are some forms of parental involvement that do appear to have a positive impact on children academically, we find at least as many instances in which more frequent involvement is related to lower academic performance.
As it turns out, the list of what generally works is short: expecting your child to go to college, discussing activities children engage in at school (despite the complications we mentioned above), and requesting a particular teacher for your child.
Do our findings suggest that parents are not important for children’s academic success? Our answer is no. We believe that parents are critical for how well children perform in school, just not in the conventional ways that our society has been promoting. The essential ingredient is for parents to communicate the value of schooling, a message that parents should be sending early in their children’s lives and that needs to be reinforced over time. But this message does not need to be communicated through conventional behavior, like attending PTA meetings or checking in with teachers.
When the federal government issues mandates on the implementation of programs that increase parental involvement, schools often encourage parents to spend more time volunteering, to attend school events, to help their children with homework and so forth. There is a strong sentiment in this country that parents matter in every respect relating to their children’s academic success, but we need to let go of this sentiment and begin to pay attention to what the evidence is telling us.
Conventional wisdom holds that since there is no harm in having an involved parent, why shouldn’t we suggest as many ways as possible for parents to participate in school? This conventional wisdom is flawed. Schools should move away from giving the blanket message to parents that they need to be more involved and begin to focus instead on helping parents find specific, creative ways to communicate the value of schooling, tailored to a child’s age. Future research should investigate how parental involvement can be made more effective, but until then, parents who have been less involved or who feel uncertain about how they should be involved should not be stigmatized.
What should parents do? They should set the stage and then leave it.
Keith Robinson, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Texas, Austin, and Angel L. Harris, a professor of sociology and African and African-American studies at Duke, are the authors of “The Broken Compass: Parental Involvement With Children’s Education.”
Of course! This is a weak attempt by university researchers to discredit parents who are protesting the crazy over-testing by opting out. The authors echo the message in Michelle Rhee’s latest speech, reported by Valerie Strauss in the Washington Post, that parents don’t really know what they are doing when they opt their kids out of standardized tests. The schools know better. Parents are actually harmful to their children’s education. Interestingly, the authors’ conclusion — for parents to just butt out — is also the preferred practice at charter schools, who prefer to offer next to no accountability at any level: parental, district, state, or national. However, the charter will call parents to get involved when they want them to wear bright t-shirts, get on a bus, and yell at lawmakers for more tax dollars. The press is playing its part in privatizing public schools, thank you again NYTimes. Wonder who paid for this quicky meta-analysis?
Dear Maureen…
I am baffled. I share the benefits of “parent involvement” as the authors cited…
If children can feel their parents support and involvement with not only them, but with their school and community, this lays a strong foundation for school success. The need to look for this being expressed by students through higher test scores as standardized measure is questionable at best.
Dear Christine…
As the article and research states, it is the ways in which parents are involved that makes a difference. The Harvard Family Research Project looked at the idea of involvement and saw what was Beyond Input: Achieving Authentic Participation in School Reform
This White Paper alone, I believe, offers some powerful information. What is perhaps even more profound is authentic evidence of a parent’s commitment.
You might see in this missive “Adourthus McDowell, a PURE parent and LSC member, invests considerable time holding the system accountable to parents. While the research was done years earlier, Adourthus McDowell remains active and committed. McDowell is involved with more than just his child’s school. His work extends out into the community. Adourthus McDowell is part of the Journey For Justice Alliance. He can be seen and heard in two films that document the 2013 Department of Education, Civil Rights Division Hearing. And yes, Arne Duncan was present, at least for the first thirty minutes.
If you have yet to see what involved parents can do when we are united, you might wish to view…Journey for Justice 2 Hearing: “Our Children are Not Collateral Damage!” http://owl.li/vY4Be
Journey for Justice Alliance: Our Children are Not Collateral Damage! http://owl.li/vY6fK
We invite your thoughts and thank you. It is always good to see authentic parent involvement.
I know if my dd were left to her own devices, at this stage and age; (5th grade, advanced/gifted); her grades would suffer for her disorganization. Executive function is something she has trouble with and her teacher and I are working to help her develop these skills. We are a team; at home and at school. If I were not intervening to be sure she completed her assignments on time AND handed them in, she’d be in a world of trouble. So i submit that teachers must be checked in with, this communication is essential for my child and I suspect others. Teacher are with our kids all day, 5 days a week and see a side of their development in situations that simply don’t exist in a “regular” home setting. Another trusted adult’s perspective and guidance can (and for us does) make all the difference
Dear Red Mommy
Precisely some forms of involvement can and sometimes do have a positive affect on a child’s education. Perhaps the regular interaction between you and your child’s teacher have a positive influence. The research says it might . However it could also have no effect or an adverse effect. How so… well it could be a crutch and your daughter might not develop the executive function she lacks.
In any case the research simply says that the traditional “parent involvement” does not show results.
Bob