Education and Parenting in the United States

Abstract

Encompassing more than 3.5 million square miles and with a population of over 300 million, the United States represents a collection of peoples who are diverse with respect to their beliefs, experiences, and access to resources. The United States has undergone dramatic political, cultural, and economic shifts over the course of its relatively brief history, many of which have been influenced by involvement in civil and world wars and the nation's ascendant place on the world stage. Unfortunately, public education policy in the United States has not always been able to anticipate or nimbly respond to such shifts, leading to a system that does not consistently and successfully serve all of its children. In the United States---perhaps more than in some other countries---parental involvement has therefore become a key influence on the extent of children's academic success. During adolescence in particular, U.S. children's academic success is partially determined by many parentally mediated factors, including the quality of the parent-child relationship, the parents' own social and economic background, and parenting practices. This chapter presents a review of the literature on parenting and academic achievement in the U.S. Our goals are to identify those parenting behaviors most tied to current definitions of student success, to identify the challenges ahead both in research and in the education of U.S. students, and to suggest future directions for improving both academic and social-emotional outcomes for U.S. students.