Student Participation and Parental Involvement in Relation to Academic Achievement

Abstract

This study shows that students, teachers, and parents in Swedish schools ascribe differing meanings and significance to students' participation in school in relation to academic achievement. Students see participation as mainly related to social interaction and not academic achievement, whilst teachers view students' participation as more closely related to activity and academic performance. Despite these differences, teachers and students are in close agreement regarding activities of a social nature. Teachers' and parents' ratings of parents' involvement in school demonstrate a higher agreement, but also correlate negatively with the academic achievement of the student. This is likely because communication is more frequent with parents of underachieving students than students demonstrating high academic performance. The partly inconsistent results in previous research regarding the relation between participation and academic achievement can here be explained by the choice of raters, as this connection only exists in ratings carried out by teachers.