The Parent Perceptions of Overall School Experiences Scale: Initial Development and Validation

Abstract

Parent engagement in schools is often precipitated by a thorough and genuine assessment of parents’ needs, priorities, and perceptions of their children’s schools. This study reports on the development and validation of the Parent Perceptions of Overall School Experiences Scale. Confirmatory factor analyses (CFAs) examined the factorial validity of the measure using cross-sectional survey data from 2,643 parents. In addition, a series of CFAs was conducted to explore the language invariance of the measurement model across Spanish and English versions of the scale. Predictive validity also was determined using correlational analyses. Results revealed that the five-item Parent Perceptions of Overall School Experiences Scale is a brief, universal measure of parents’ perceptions of their overall experiences with their children’s schools. Schools, parents, and community members may use this measure to assess parents’ needs and to advocate for necessary programmatic changes that serve parents and their children.

Research and Practice: An Applied Examination of the Parental Perceptions of Developmental Outcomes Scale

“…As the results suggested, the PPDO is a promising metric for OST practitioners assessing developmental outcomes associated with the camp experience from the perspective of parents. The significance of engaging parents through measuring their perceptions of programs and services is also supported in the broader social science literature (Ball, Bates, Amorose, & Anderson-Butcher, 2017;Schueler, Capotosto, Bahena, McIntyre, & Gehlbach, 2014). Furthermore, access to measures of parent perceptions are particularly important at a time when camp program providers have identified the intensification of parental expectations for their child's camp experience (Garst, Gagnon, & Bennett, 2016), and being able to better understand parent perceptions of their child's camp experience can help program providers better meet the needs of parents-their primary stakeholder.…”

Involvement of parents of children with ADHD in schools: Implications for social work practice

“…In the long run, social workers can assist school leaders to identify positive measures as perceived by the parents. For example, Ball et al (2017) have developed a “Parent Perceptions of Overall School Experiences Scale” to measure parents’ overall experiences regarding their child's school. This provides important information for schools to determine what kinds of services are identified as being effective and useful for parents.…”

“…Nowadays, parental involvement exists in many forms. For example, parents are involved in children's home-based activities (Ball et al, 2017; Tran, 2014). Stevenson and Baker (1987) reveal that more highly educated parents with a younger child will tend to be more involved in the child's school activities, as a result of which the child performs better in school.…”

Parents’ and caregivers’ perceptions of the school climate: development and validation of the Parent and Caregiver Survey (PaCS)

“…Effective approaches also seek to empower (rather than just inform or use) parents (Christianakis 2011;Higgins and Morley 2014;Choi 2017); to disrupt unbalanced power dynamics between school staff and parents (Hernández et al 2016); and to overcome deficitbased attitudes towards parents and communitiesparticularly those who have been traditionally marginalised (Australian Government n.d.; Chenhall et al 2011;Christianakis 2011;Higgins and Morley 2014;Choi 2017;Hernández et al 2016). Importantly, effective approaches to engaging parents also incorporate attention to parents' perceptions of the school itself, an aspect which is sometimes overlooked (McKenna and Millen 2013;A. Ball et al 2017).…”

“…Two of the surveys, however, use aggregate scales that aim to measure parents' overall perceptions of the school and/or their relationship with it (Schueler et al 2014;A. Ball et al 2017).…”