Abstract
ABSTRACTThis paper reports a small-scale study on the websites of 12 K-9 schools from four municipalities in Sweden. The purpose of the study is to explore, describe, and compare what and how information relevant for parental use is presented by local schools on their websites, which reflect the schools’ perceptions, intentions and strategies of communicating and cooperating with families. Epstein’s six key components regarding parental involvement are used as a theoretical framework in order to examine and analyse the content of school website settings. To evaluate the website design features, the website evaluation metrics suggested by Parajuli are adapted and applied. The results indicate that information on school websites for parental use is generally limited. It seems that schools’ expectations for parental involvement in education are based mainly on the social aspects of student development, rather than on pedagogical issues. In general, the websites of independent schools are more attractive than most public schools’ websites in terms of information richness and freshness, variations and friendliness. There is a need to develop websites that are more accessible for parents with immigrant backgrounds and non-Swedish speakers.
Highlights
During recent decades, the traditional home–school relationship, which is characterized by separate responsibilities for home and school, and authority of the teacher, has been challenged by the transition to more of a micro-democracy, where ‘partnership’, ‘user influence’, and ‘freedom of choice’ serve as the main principles for constructing and managing the home–school relationships, and for the changing role of teachers and parents (Epstein & Sheldon, 2006; Erikson, 2011, 2012; Tallberg Broman, 2013)
Since using school website to examine home–school relationships and parental involvement has not been investigated in previous studies in Sweden, this study considers small samples to be practical and manageable for identifying the critical variables relevant to this new research field
The results indicate that there was a lack of information and activities of parental volunteering on the school websites, which is one of the important aspects in school-based parental involvement according to Epstein (2009)
Summary
The traditional home–school relationship, which is characterized by separate responsibilities for home and school, and authority of the teacher, has been challenged by the transition to more of a micro-democracy, where ‘partnership’, ‘user influence’, and ‘freedom of choice’ serve as the main principles for constructing and managing the home–school relationships, and for the changing role of teachers and parents (Epstein & Sheldon, 2006; Erikson, 2011, 2012; Tallberg Broman, 2013) Research in this area has mainly addressed the parents’ right and opportunities to choose their preferred schools for their children, and the consequences brought about by this (Poikolainen & Silmäri-Salo, 2015). We are able to gain knowledge about the critical elements and features for parental use to increase their involvement in and influence on school management under the new condition of the digital society
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