Title
The Impact of Increasing Parental Involvement and Parental Support on Students’ Academic Achievement
Needs Assessment
Over the course of several years the faculty and staff observed a lack of parental involvement on our campus. Academically, the campus as a whole is still successful, but there is room for improvement. According to the research of Epstein (2001) children learn and develop through three overlapping “spheres of influence:” family, school, and community. The campus feels that student achievement will increase in data if there were an increase in parental involvement. If we get the parents more involved in their child’s education the campus would not only increase academically but socially as well.
Objectives and Vision of the action research project
To create and maintain a partnership and collaboration with parents to accomplish the following goals:
· provide every parent with opportunities to contribute to students’ educational and life- long success
· support parents as primary educators and advocates for their children
· ensure parents are involved in decision making on the campus.
Review of the Literature and Action Research Strategy
The lack of parental involvement has always been talk among teachers and staff on my campus. I spoke with my site supervisor about my action research plan and we together decided that my action research project on the positive impact of increasing parental involvement on student achievement would definitely be beneficial for our campus.
Parent involvement has been shown to be an important variable that positively influences children’s education. Epstein (2001) discusses how children learn and develop through three overlapping “spheres of influence:” family, school, and community. These three spheres must work collaborately to best meet the needs of the children. Epstein defines six types of involvement based on the relationships between the family, school, and community: parenting skills, communicating, volunteering, learning at home, decision making, and collaborating with the community. He stresses that all of the six types of involvement need to be included to obtain successful partnerships.
Articulate the Vision
I communicated the vision and goal of my action research project to teachers, parents, and community members during PTA meetings and Spring Open House with a PowerPoint and handouts. I also communicated the vision to the whole staff during one of our monthly faculty meetings. When presenting the program, I stressed the importance of the goal to increase in parental involvement and it would lead to a noticeable increase in student achievement. I also handed out literature that supported the idea of increasing parental involvement will increase student achievement at all of the above mentioned events.
Manage the organization
I sat down with my site supervisor and discussed the action research plan and what needed to be done to implement, monitor and evaluate my action research project. The action research project will be a collaborative effort between the faculty, parents and myself. With assistance from my site supervisor and assistant principal, I was able to develop my presentation to the staff regarding my action research project and the need for assistance. I presented to the faculty the project and outline of the research that was being gathered. After explaining the staff my intentions and my research plan, responsibilities were handed out and distributed to staff members. I would be responsible for delivery of content and evaluation of the program. My responsibilities focused on gathering the initial data of score results, strategically pulling data in a timely manner, and analyzing the data results. I also presented to parents at Open House my goal to increase parental involvement and the expected results. My responsibilities continued as one of the persons who will continually reach out to parents to stay involved to increase student learning and safety for our students. The shared duties distributed to staff members were included ensuring teachers, parents, students and the community was given opportunities for volunteering on campus and ways to assist their children at home. A letter outlining the purpose of the research project along with a parent questionnaire was sent home by the students to give to their parents and they had to return them back to their teachers. Teachers and staff ensured that parents were constantly motivated to participate daily with students and welcomed to contribute in every way possible on the campus.
Manage Operations
I have constant collaboration with my site supervisor to determine and manage the operations of my research project. I have teachers keep logs of parental contact and use those to review progress in parental involvement. In addition, I monitor and review monthly parent meetings sign in sheets and weekly grade level meeting sign in sheets to help monitor the progress of the research plan. The sign in sheets for our parent volunteers in the front office helps me monitor the progress as well. These logs and sign-in sheets help me analyze the increase in parental involvement and use the information to correlate the change in data with testing and academic results.
Respond to Community Interest and Needs
My action research project will serve to meet the needs of all students on the campus. By increasing parental involvement student achievement will increase academically and socially. Teachers and parents will be allowed to learn about best practice and have time to contribute to students’ academic achievement and becoming responsible and productive citizens. When parents get involved such as going to school events, helping with homework children’s schooling is benefited by knowledge, skills, and confidence.
Epstein, J. L. & Sheldon, S.B. (2001). Improving student attendance: Effects of family and community involvement. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association, Washington, DC.
