Predictors of Parental School Involvement in a Latino Metropolis.

Parental school involvement can positively impact student academic outcomes and the quality of educational programming available in schools. This paper examines the associations of parental employment, socio-economic background, race, and immigrant characteristics with the level of parental school participation in a Latino-dominated metropolitan context. The 2001 Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Study is used to identify patterns of parental school involvement among a representative sample of primary caregivers in Los Angeles County. Findings show that for parents, working full-time or more is associated with less participation in children's school activities, but working part-time shows no link to differences in the level of school participation in comparison to not working. Higher levels of education have an anticipated effect of being positively associated with the level of parental school participation. Results show no racial differences in school participation, but they do indicate that immigrants who have lived in the U.S. longer have higher levels of parental school involvement than the native-born population, net of other factors. Being a monolingual Spanish speaker appears to present barriers to participation, but being an undocumented immigrant is not associated with the level of school involvement after controlling for immigrant and individual characteristics. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]