| Due to recent developments, many schools are seeking to increase the level of parental participation within schools. Previous research and the avenues on which parental involvement have focused are at the elementary and middle school levels. I desired to look at high schools. With the trend toward more involvement of parents, I began with the premise that before programs are implemented to increase involvement, teachers should be asked about their views of parents and parental involvement. To gather this information, 70 teachers from two high schools completed a survey, and 23 teachers volunteered for follow-up interviews.;Teachers agreed that increasing parental involvement would benefit the school. However, teachers differed on what they said was acceptable and unacceptable involvement. This study also suggests that teachers may be unaware of school practices that increase levels of parental involvement and increase levels of student achievement. Finally, some teachers may have created stereotypes of parents based on the level of involvement that parents provide, socioeconomic standing of the parents, and achievement level of the student. Those stereotypes, in turn, may create obstacles to parental involvement. |
