Abstract
Despite a growing body of research on parental involvement and its effects on students' academic achievement, our knowledge about the mechanism of parental involvement in non-Western contexts remains scarce. Our study addresses this gap by exploring the factors that motivate parents from different socioeconomic status and educational levels to be involved in their children's education in Java, Indonesia. We further explored how parents were involved and what challenges they faced in their involvement. The analysis is embedded in Hoover-Dempsey and Sandler's parental involvement motivation model. Sixteen parents in eight elementary schools in urban and rural areas in Java participated in this interview study. We found differences in parents' expectations and aspirations for their children's education and in their perceptions of their obligations and responsibilities regarding their children's education. These differences were related to parents' socioeconomic background and also to the urban and rural community contexts. Although all parents felt welcome at school, some highly educated parents reported lack of power and lack of opportunity for active parental involvement at the school. As is typical for a collectivist culture such as the Indonesian society, this study points to the shared responsibility of some Indonesian parents for the education of children other than their own in the local community.
