Differences in the Participation of Parents in the Education of Mexican High School Students: Relation with Gender and Level of Studies

Abstract

The purposes of the study consisted of describing the profiles of subgroups of the parents of high school students based on their participation in the education of their children and establish the relation of these profiles with the gender and level of studies of fathers and mothers. By using a simple random sampling, 374 parents of high school students were selected to participate; of these, 173 (46.2%) questionnaires were answered by fathers and 201 (53.7%) by mothers. By using a K-means cluster analysis, two subgroups of parents were identified and denominated by their participation as "Low Involvement" (n = 205) and "Moderate Involvement" (n = 169) respectively, which presented differences in all the types of participation evaluated. However, in both groups a similar profile was identified, which is characterized by a high participation in aspects related to education at home and a low level with regard to aspects concerning school management. Furthermore, a relationship was found between females and higher education, with a greater involvement in the education of children. It is concluded that diverse difficulties exist in families who participate within the school management.

Parental Involvement among First- and Second-generation Latin Americans in the United States

“…Machismo and marianismo, for fathers and mothers respectively, differentiate social roles in Latin culture by gender and represent a significant part of norms underlying many of the mechanisms promoting traditional gender roles and ideologies (Falicov, 2010;Mendez-Luck et al, 2016). Research on Latino parenting remains inconclusive, with some research showing that although gender ideologies in Latino families persist over generations, these ideologies are not predictive of father involvement (Bronstein, 1984), even when fathers receive more education, although more educated mothers are more involved (Cuervo et al, 2014). Other research, however, has shown that more equitable gender ideologies in Latino families and higher levels of paternal education will increase the likelihood of father involvement (Kato-Wallace et al, 2014;Taylor & Behnke, 2005).…”