Miriam David

Parental Involvement in Education in and out of School

Abstract This paper explores the ways in which parents—mothers and fathers—are involved in their childrens education both in and out of school. It compares involvement of families with children in the final year of primary education (or its equivalent) in state and private schools, and amongst the state school parents compares families in terms of social class and mothers’ educational level. The findings indicate that mothers generally assume overriding responsibility for their childrens education. Furthermore, mothers with higher levels of education are more likely to use workbooks and employ private tutors to support their childrens education; attendance at parents’ evenings and informal discussions with teachers were also more likely to be shared with the childs father. It is suggested that mothers’ educational level is a better predictor of involvement than is social class and that, in the face of a diversification of family forms, mothers’ education may be more instructive in understanding educat...

Choices and destinations at transfer to secondary schools in London

It has been argued that the recent parental choice reforms in the UK favour middle‐class families. The paper reports quantitative and qualitative research evidence drawn from a recent ESRC‐funded study. In this study, middle‐class children were neither significantly more likely to be offered a place at their familys first‐choice school nor to be offered more places per application made. It is argued that routes through the education system have to be understood both in terms of patterns of applications and selection by schools. Various familial preferences are examined according to the childs sex, whether the child attends a private primary school, whether the childs primary school is affiliated to the Roman Catholic church, the ethnic background of the family and the familys social class. It is reported that middle‐class families prefer selective and higher scoring (in terms of performance league tables) schools. We examine why middle‐class families tend to use higher scoring schools. It is suggested...

Choices and Expectations at Primary and Secondary Stages in the State and Private Sectors

Summary This paper examines a range of issues concerned with the process of choosing schools in the private and state sectors at the primary/pre‐preparatory stage and at the time of transfer to secondary/senior school. The findings indicate that choices about schools are made at different times and in different ways by parents who use the state and private sectors. One of the key findings is that the process of choosing a school begins earlier in the private than in the state sector; another is that quality of education is cited more frequently as one of the ‘top three’ essential factors by parents of children in the private sector. At both the primary and transfer to secondary stages, very high percentages of parents consider it essential that their child should be happy. A discussion of the different notions that private school and the state school parents may have of ‘happiness’ is offered.

From Keighley to Keele: Personal reflections on a circuitous journey through education, family, feminism and policy sociology

This paper uses the methods of personal reflection and auto/biography to consider the ways in which global social and political transformations have influenced a key generation of feminist sociologists entering the academy and attempting to introduce feminist knowledge and pedagogy into academic curricula. Three critical events on or around 22 November are used to highlight key political moments, the associated development of changing themes in forms of analysis of social transformations, and the part played by feminism and sociology within higher education. They are the assassination of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy in 1963, the Israeli-Arab war in 1973 and the resignation of Margaret Thatcher in 1990. The argument is that there has been a clear relation between changing social and political contexts and methodological understandings, which have drawn on developing feminist perspectives and reflexive sociological analysis, especially as embraced within the sociology of education. In particular, the shift from a political and professional perspective on social change and family life towards one that engages with personal issues is noteworthy. It is one of the hallmarks of both feminist notions associated with reflexivity and developing sociological methodologies and policy sociology. Thus, the personal and the political are now central methodological forms of feminist and sociological analysis within education and, especially, the sociology of education, influencing pedagogy within higher education, especially associated with developments in professional postgraduate education. I weave my personal reflections on my professional developments through an analysis of the key moments related to specific policy regimes and changing forms of understandings within the fields of policy sociology and sociology of education. I conclude with current concerns about the balances between the personal and professional within educational research and policy sociology.

Parents, Gender, and Education.

This article discusses social justice in education, specifically issues of social equity and equal opportunities on the grounds of gender. The article explores the ways in which the Right in government in advanced industrial societies, but particularly in Britain and the United States, has tried to implement a new right-wing agenda of parental choice and standards. This is in contrast to earlier liberal administrations that sought to provide equality of educational opportunity by reducing the differences between families through parental privilege or poverty or involving mothers in their childrens education. The conclusion is drawn that right-wing strategies will increase social diversity and sexual inequalities around the role of parents, especially mothers.

A Gender Agenda: women and family in the new ERA?

Abstract This paper explores the relationship between the Conservative ‘educational reforms’ in the 1980s, which purported to give parents more democratic rights as consumers and participants in education, and changes in family life in Britain. It focuses on those demographic, familial changes, in particular in gender relationships, towards mothers having more public and private responsibilities for children and their education. It looks at whether these changes in family life have, in fact, been taken account of in ‘educational reforms’. It asks the question about whether ‘education reforms’ which give more democratic rights to parents in general allow for more democratic rights for women as mothers, in the contexts of lone motherhood, maternal participation in paid employment and adult/higher education. On the other hand, are the implications of such education changes to increase the private responsibilities, rather than democratic rights, of motherhood? Although family is on the education policy agenda...

Teenage Parenthood is Bad for Parents and Children

“Teenage parenthood is bad for parents and children” (Social Exclusion Unit, 1999a, p. 90) was a statement from an officiai British document prescribing poverty and education policies to tackle social exclusion arising from teenage pregnancy. The U.S. government made similar statements in developing “programs for abstinence education” for teens to teach “that bearing children out-of-wedlock is likely to have harmful consequences for the child, the child’s parents, and society” (Social Security Act #510 1996). Most recently, President Bush refused to endorse a UN declaration on children’s rights unless UN plans for sexuality and health education taught only abstinence before marriage (New Statesman, May 17, 2002).

Femifesta? Reflections on writing a feminist memoir and a feminist manifesto

ABSTRACT This is a reflective account of the publication of two books in the same year (2016): Reclaiming Feminism: Challenging Everyday Misogyny and Feminist Manifesto for Education. The former is a popular but scholarly memoir, and the latter is an academic text for sociology and education. It was never my intention to publish one, let alone, two books but I was spurred to do so by the prevailing socio-political and cultural climate: what I now see clearly as everyday misogyny.