Parental Level of Education and its Implications of their Expectations towards their Children Academic Performance

Abstract

Purpose: This study was carried out to investigate the effects of parental level of education and the type of expectations they have for their children’s academic achievement. Methodology: This study made use of descriptive survey design. The sample was made up of 100 randomly selected lower sixth students of Government Bilingual High School (GBHS) Down Town and GBHS Ntamulung and 50 conveniently selected parents. The instruments used for data collection were questionnaire and interview guide. In data processing, a pre-designed EpiData Version 3.1 database which has in-built consistency and validation checks was used to enter the data. Further, consistency, data range and validation checks were also performed in SPSS version 21.0. The data were presented using frequency counts, graphs, percentages and the Pearson Product Moment Correlation coefficient was used to test hypotheses. Findings: The findings indicated that there was a significant relationship between the level of education of parents and set expectations for children’s academic achievement. Recommendations: This study recommend parents to obtain a clearer understanding of their beliefs and expectations concerning their children. For example, while many parents may be setting very high academic expectations for their children, they should understand how those expectations play out in terms of student performance. Also parents should realize that parental expectations may be unrelated to students’ prior performance, and they should be aware that parental expectations may not be linked to students' perception about their academic competence. Also, parents are discouraged from expectations based on their SES background, and encouraged to become sensitive to the children’s abilities and interests. The counselling implications for this study reveals that the guidance counsellors should be able to know when a student needs help so as to intervene with appropriate counselling programs to help the student out of a stressful situation by coming up with inclusive programs for parents, teachers and students during which educational dynamics are exposed to the stakeholders of education.