A Pilot Study of Collective Parent Engagement and Children's Academic Achievement

Parent involvement (PI) programs typically represent an important improvement strategy for schools serving low-income children of color. This pilot study offers an alternative to conventional PI approaches, collective parent engagement (CPE). The study relied on a post hoc, quasiexperimental design, and data were collected from 32 low-income, minority parents. Participants were assigned to two study groups: a CPE study group (n = 16) and a comparison group (n = 16). Using ordinary least squares regression, this study examined CPE treatment effects in children's standardized test scores and parents' empowerment scores. Consistent with the extant PI literature, these models yielded higher standardized test scores for children of parents in the CPE study group. Parent empowerment scores for parents involved in the CPE study group also were higher than those in the comparison group. However, in contrast to extant theory, the relationship between parent empowerment and children's test scores was generally not significant. Future research is needed on the mechanisms that underlie these relationships.