Differences in the Participation of Parents in the Education of Mexican High School Students: Relation with Gender and Level of Studies

The purposes of the study consisted of describing the profiles of subgroups of the parents of high school studentsbased on their participation in the education of their children and establish the relation of these profiles with thegender and level of studies of fathers and mothers. By using a simple random sampling, 374 parents of highschool students were selected to participate; of these, 173 (46.2%) questionnaires were answered by fathers and201 (53.7%) by mothers. By using a K-means cluster analysis, two subgroups of parents were identified anddenominated by their participation as “Low Involvement†(n = 205) and “Moderate Involvement†(n = 169)respectively, which presented differences in all the types of participation evaluated. However, in both groups asimilar profile was identified, which is characterized by a high participation in aspects related to education athome and a low level with regard to aspects concerning school management. Furthermore, a relationship wasfound between females and higher education, with a greater involvement in the education of children. It isconcluded that diverse difficulties exist in families who participate within the school management.