School choice and parent involvement among Australian children starting school

In this chapter, we examine the connection between school choice and parent-school involvement in an Australian sample of over 3700 6–7 year-old children. Parents provided information on the type of school the child attended (government-public, Catholic, independent-private), the most important reason for their choice, and whether they had visited the child’s classroom, contacted a teacher, attended a school event, and volunteered at the school. Results showed that, overall, Australian parents had participated in 2.84 activities; however, higher levels of involvement were reported by parents whose choice was based on school academic reputation, availability of specific programs, or religious teachings (average = 3.00) compared to parents whose choice was based on convenience (average = 2.69) or familiarity (average = 2.76). Involvement also differed by type of school, but when both school type and reasons were included in the analyses, school type was no longer a significant predictor of parent school-based involvement. Level of parent-school involvement was largely determined by parents’ reasons for school choice.