Efficiency of School through the Eyes of Parents

In order to discover how parents of school students evaluate the state of things at school and what their expectations are in the light of the pay rise for teachers, in May and June of 2013 the Center for Continuing Education Economics under the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and P...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Elena Avraamova, Tatyana Klyachko, Dmitry Loginov
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE) 2014-09-01
Series:Вопросы образования
Subjects:
Online Access:https://vo.hse.ru/article/view/15415
_version_ 1797902651278491648
author Elena Avraamova
Tatyana Klyachko
Dmitry Loginov
author_facet Elena Avraamova
Tatyana Klyachko
Dmitry Loginov
author_sort Elena Avraamova
collection DOAJ
description In order to discover how parents of school students evaluate the state of things at school and what their expectations are in the light of the pay rise for teachers, in May and June of 2013 the Center for Continuing Education Economics under the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration questioned 3,300 parents (legal representatives) of school students in three regions of Russia: Sverdlovsk Oblast, Voronezh Oblast and Ivanovo Oblast, i. e. in a donor region, in a region with average social and economic indicators, and in a heavily subsidized region. The monitoring has been continued for the year 2014. Based on the data obtained, we have analyzed parental demands towards school education, degree of parents’ satisfaction, sufficiency of school education to pass the State Final Examination (SFE) and the Unified State Exam (USE), parents’ perception of the efficiency of school education in the context of the teacher pay rise. No essential difference was revealed between parental perceptions of the state of things at school in different regions, despite the significant gap between the living standards. Parental demands towards school are restricted to three core objectives: give children knowledge required for grown-up life and work; provide socialization (discipline, rules of behavior, getting into the habit of working, development of communication skills, etc.); inculcate interest to sports and productive hobbies. Parents believe that strong specialized schools are more productive in performing those functions. Thus, we conclude that teacher pay rise has not yet been helping reduce differentiation between schools by quality of education. Despite a rather high level of overall satisfaction with school education, parents tend to believe that their children won’t succeed in getting high SFE and USE scores with no test preparation courses. Almost one third of parents think that teacher pay rise could influence quality of education significantly (31.4%), while 40.3% feel changes would be inconsiderable. An overwhelming majority of parents count school teachers as middle class, which means that Russian teachers are no more perceived by parents and, hence, by students as economically unsuccessful, as it used to be in the early 2000s.
first_indexed 2024-04-10T09:21:02Z
format Article
id doaj.art-989683058b05416c92517448d4ecb806
institution Directory Open Access Journal
issn 1814-9545
2412-4354
language English
last_indexed 2024-04-10T09:21:02Z
publishDate 2014-09-01
publisher National Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE)
record_format Article
series Вопросы образования
spelling doaj.art-989683058b05416c92517448d4ecb8062023-02-20T11:33:15ZengNational Research University Higher School of Economics (HSE)Вопросы образования1814-95452412-43542014-09-01311813410.17323/1814-9545-2014-3-118-13415415Efficiency of School through the Eyes of ParentsElena Avraamova0Tatyana Klyachko1Dmitry Loginov2Institute for Social Analysis and Forecasting, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public AdministrationInstitute for Social Analysis and Forecasting, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA)Institute for Social Analysis and Forecasting, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public AdministrationIn order to discover how parents of school students evaluate the state of things at school and what their expectations are in the light of the pay rise for teachers, in May and June of 2013 the Center for Continuing Education Economics under the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration questioned 3,300 parents (legal representatives) of school students in three regions of Russia: Sverdlovsk Oblast, Voronezh Oblast and Ivanovo Oblast, i. e. in a donor region, in a region with average social and economic indicators, and in a heavily subsidized region. The monitoring has been continued for the year 2014. Based on the data obtained, we have analyzed parental demands towards school education, degree of parents’ satisfaction, sufficiency of school education to pass the State Final Examination (SFE) and the Unified State Exam (USE), parents’ perception of the efficiency of school education in the context of the teacher pay rise. No essential difference was revealed between parental perceptions of the state of things at school in different regions, despite the significant gap between the living standards. Parental demands towards school are restricted to three core objectives: give children knowledge required for grown-up life and work; provide socialization (discipline, rules of behavior, getting into the habit of working, development of communication skills, etc.); inculcate interest to sports and productive hobbies. Parents believe that strong specialized schools are more productive in performing those functions. Thus, we conclude that teacher pay rise has not yet been helping reduce differentiation between schools by quality of education. Despite a rather high level of overall satisfaction with school education, parents tend to believe that their children won’t succeed in getting high SFE and USE scores with no test preparation courses. Almost one third of parents think that teacher pay rise could influence quality of education significantly (31.4%), while 40.3% feel changes would be inconsiderable. An overwhelming majority of parents count school teachers as middle class, which means that Russian teachers are no more perceived by parents and, hence, by students as economically unsuccessful, as it used to be in the early 2000s.https://vo.hse.ru/article/view/15415teacherssocial demandremuneration of laborstatus of professionconsumers of education system services
spellingShingle Elena Avraamova
Tatyana Klyachko
Dmitry Loginov
Efficiency of School through the Eyes of Parents
Вопросы образования
teachers
social demand
remuneration of labor
status of profession
consumers of education system services
title Efficiency of School through the Eyes of Parents
title_full Efficiency of School through the Eyes of Parents
title_fullStr Efficiency of School through the Eyes of Parents
title_full_unstemmed Efficiency of School through the Eyes of Parents
title_short Efficiency of School through the Eyes of Parents
title_sort efficiency of school through the eyes of parents
topic teachers
social demand
remuneration of labor
status of profession
consumers of education system services
url https://vo.hse.ru/article/view/15415
work_keys_str_mv AT elenaavraamova efficiencyofschoolthroughtheeyesofparents
AT tatyanaklyachko efficiencyofschoolthroughtheeyesofparents
AT dmitryloginov efficiencyofschoolthroughtheeyesofparents