Difficulties of Families to Participate in Schools

Abstract

Parental involvement in schools is positive for the students, their families and the schools themselves. However, there are circumstances that make it difficult for parents to participate, and which deserve attention in order to promote intervention measures to this regard. This is the objective of this study, in which 880 Spanish fathers and mothers with children enrolled in the 2nd and 4th grade of compulsory secondary school filled in the Family-School Relationship Trust Scale (adapted by Martínez-González, 1996). The results obtained after performing group comparisons taking into account the gender, age, level of literacy and work circumstances of the parents, show that the main difficulties to participate come from work timetable (fathers) and children's upbringing (mothers). Thus, work and family life conciliation measures are needed as well as adapting the school timetable to the parents' possibilities to participate.