Systematic Review on Parental Involvement in secondary Schools

Parental involvement in education has been a popular issue for a long time and covers various aspects. Using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) method, this systematic review collects documents from databases and filters each document in accordance with established procedures. As a result, a total of twenty documents were analyzed and discussed in this paper. Four key themes were successfully obtained, namely parent relationship with teacher or principal or school, SES relationship with students’ achievement, parental support and benefits of parental engagement towards academic attainment. In conclusion, studies on parental involvement are still ongoing, and various aspects can be investigated to see how they relate to parental involvement in education.


Introduction
The involvement of parents in education has been widely discussed for a long time. The Bronfenbrenner Ecological System Theory and Vygotsky Sociocultural Theory, as well as Epstein's Model Six Types of Parental Engagement and the Hoover-Dempsey and Sandler Parental Engagement Process Model, are among the most widely used theories and models in the study of parental engagement. Various definitions of parental involvement can be found in the literature as these definitions depend on the location and culture of the community under study. Parental involvement can be defined as the interaction between parents, children and schools using human, financial and social resources (Satar et al., 2020). According to the No Child Left Behind Act, 2001, parental involvement is the participation of parents in regular, two-way communication and giving meaning about their children's academics and other school activities (Department of Education United States of America, 2004). Besides, parental involvement also involves school governance, volunteering and providing facilities (Clinton & Hattie, 2013).
Studies related to parental involvement touched on various aspects including the type of engagement, the impact on students, and the influence of teachers. Parental involvement, for example, has been shown to affect children's education (Ateş, 2021;Maldonado et al., 2019) and parents of refugees are also concerned about their children's education (Sarikoudi & Apostolidou, 2020). Vald´es-Cuervo et al (2022) discovered that teacher practise has an impact on mothers' motivation and involvement in their children's education. Furthermore, there are numerous studies on parental involvement involving pupils or parents at various levels of schooling, such as parental involvement in preschool (Jeon et al., 2020;Varshney et al., 2020;Zhang, 2021), parental involvement in primary school (Mohd Satar et al., 2020) and parental involvement at both primary and secondary schools (Ribeiro et al., 2021). There are also studies that highlight the issue of challenges or obstacles in parental engagement (Abdullah Kamal et al., 2021;Goss, 2017;Jefferson, 2014).
Studies on parental involvement are still going on today and will continue to be relevant in the future. As a result, by using systematic methods in the selection of documents included in the literature, the writing of this systematic review contributes to a better understanding of parental involvement in education that focuses on pupils or parents of pupils in secondary school.

Study Objective
The main objective of this study was to identify studies related to parental involvement at secondary school level.

Method
This paper is a systematic literature review (SLR) conducted using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (Page et al., 2021). It is a method used in the process of writing systematic literature surveys and meta-analysis. Xiao dan Watson (2019) insisted that SLR can improve quality, reliability and validity of the review being made.
This paper compiles all Scopus-indexed articles between January 2019 and June 2021. There are 1,683 documents based on searches made on the Scopus official website using the keywords "parental" AND "involvement" AND "in" AND "school" AND "education." When filtering search data, the author uses a number of criteria. One of them is that by restricting search results to articles published between 2019 and 2021, the types of documents are limited to articles and reviews, and the type of source is limited to journals only. Furthermore, the search article is only available in English, and the scope of the search is limited to the fields of social sciences, arts, and humanities. This search covers all types of access to the article and is not limited to one type of access only. As a result, a total of 209 title-related documents that meet the specified criteria were obtained. The next step is to transfer all these search results into the EndNote X8 software. The use of this software is aimed at facilitating the process of filtering data. Among the functions that this software has gained is that it is capable of detecting documents that are repeatedly entered (duplication) and all document files in PDF format can be linked to the title of the document listed in this software. The next step is to filter the data. All articles and reviews containing the phrases 'learning disabilities', 'children with disabilities', 'elementary education', 'early childhood education', 'primary school', 'inclusive education' and 'special educational needs' were omitted. The rationale behind this action is to ensure that the study only focuses on studies involving secondary school students and do not include Students with Special Needs (MBK). 96 documents were omitted out of the initial 209 articles and reviews. A total of 113 documents were preceded to the next step which involves reading of abstracts. Reports not retrieved (n = 8) Reports assessed for eligibility (n = 21) Reports excluded: (n = 1) due to does not meet the criterion Studies included in review (n = 20)

Included
Following the review of the abstracts, a total of 64 documents were excluded from the research, bringing the current total to 49 documents. The evaluation of the abstract is done carefully to avoid any errors in determining whether an article should be excluded or otherwise. The author reads each abstract carefully and if necessary, the abstract reading is repeated several times until the author gets a clear picture of the article. All articles containing the phrases 'basic education', 'educational equality/inequality' and 'migrant/immigrant/refugee families' are also excluded. The setting of these criteria is to focus on studies that do not contain factors such as a country's policies and racial gaps that may influence the results of the original study.
The next step is to obtain the full text of each abstract. 20 articles had to be excluded from the 50 articles obtained through the previous abstract screening process because the full text was not available. Researchers use the university library's access to the indexing bodies of journals and articles to obtain the full text of these articles. In addition, internet search engines were also used for the same purpose. The full texts obtained through these two channels are articles that can be accessed for free; whether it is classified as 'Open Access' or a journal or database that the university library has subscribed to. Articles that require payment, a subscription or permission request from the original author to obtain their full text were not included in the review due to cost and time constraints.
Out of the 30 articles which can be accessed, eight of them had to be removed because they had a phrase or study focus that did not meet the criteria required by the author. Among the phrases are 'private school', 'elementary school' and 'kindergarten' as this review paper focuses only on studies at the secondary school level and does not include private schools. Hence, a total of 20 documents are listed as the final result of the screening process and used in this review paper. However, an article had to be removed at this stage as the full-text article was found not fulfilling the criteria set because the study involved pupils other than secondary school pupils; not meeting the initial criteria, which is that only studies involving secondary school pupils were taken into account.
All the document screening and selection processes were carried out carefully and meticulously by the two authors. Other than that, a senior lecturer is also directly involved in the completion of this review where he is responsible for reviewing each selected document before submitting further assignments to students as proposed by Xiao & Watson (2019). Mutual consent is required to ensure that the review conducted is of good quality and will not be disputed.

Results
Out of the total 1683 documents screened in the early stages after the search using keywords, only twenty documents met all the criteria set out in this systematic review. There are four main themes derived from the total of 20 documents collected. The first theme is 'parent relationships with teachers or principals or schools' followed by the second theme which is the 'relevance of SES with student achievement'. The next theme is 'parental support' and the final theme is the 'benefits of parental engagement towards academic attainment'. Table  1.1 summarises the information related to each selected study together with the name of the author and the data collection method.

Parent Relationships with Teachers or Principals or Schools
This theme is the first theme derived from the review of the 20 documents relevant to the current study. Six articles focused on this theme, which can further be divided into four subthemes which are communication, attitude, policy and training. Anastasiou & Papagianni (2020) found that parents, teachers and principals agree that communication can be established between the school and parents through the implementation of certain events in the school that require cooperation between them as well as frequent meetings. In another study, Brown et al (2020) explained that decisions made by the school should be informed to parents and students. This finding is in line with the results of a study by Lumadi (2019) which suggested that parents should be involved in making school-related decisions. Whereas students whose parents have never been or only connected once with teachers get less attention from teachers than other pupils (Young, 2020).
The next sub-theme is 'attitude' which is more directed towards the attitude of teachers and parents. Teachers were found to be less fond of parental involvement involving their professional assignments and argued that parents should not be given a significant influence in education-related matters (Anastasiou & Papagianni, 2020). On top of that, Quan-Baffour (2020) explained that there are members in the School Management Body (SGB) who act beyond the jurisdiction of the School Management Team (SMT). In addition, the frequency of parent-teacher communication also affects the attitude of teachers in the classroom (Young, 2020).
The third sub-theme which is 'policy' was extracted from several studies such as a study in Sweden by (Dodillet & Christensen, 2020). In their study, it was found that parents in Sweden were less involved in their children's education due to a number of factors such as school and administrator policies. Therefore, they lack the space and opportunities to contribute ideas. On the other hand, the implementation of the school-related act in South Africa caused major changes in the education system (Quan-Baffour, 2020). The study found that changes in education leadership require the cooperation of all parties who are directly involved in making a decision.
The last sub-theme is 'training'. It refers to the training that needs to be given to parents or SGB members. For example, a study by Lumadi (2019) suggested that parents should be trained to be actively engage in their child's learning. Quan-Baffour (2020) stated that SGB members should be given training by the Department of Education because they lack knowledge and experience in school-related matters as well as most of them have low level of education.

SES Relationship with Students' Achievement
A total of five of the 21 documents analysed examined the relationship between SES and student achievement. Chung et al. (2019) found that SES i.e. family income and education are not the main factors that influence parental affection. The same study also found that the results of studies conducted on single mothers or single fathers were less accurate. Thomas et al. (2019) also found that parental employment was insignificant to student achievement. However, students with less learning materials and facilities at home were found to have lower drive and motivation to learn (Fadiji, 2020). Parents with higher levels of education were found to have higher expectations of their child's education (Wang et al., 2020), while parents from higher SES were more interested in connecting with teachers than other parents (Young, 2020).

Parental Support
Parental support comes in many forms and among the sub-themes derived from the theme of parental support are active engagement, affection, discipline formation and influence of interest. The lack of parental involvement is sometimes considered an 'urban problem' and those who are willing to engage should be welcome (Howard et al., 2019). Another study by Xu et al (2019) found that parents were less involved in their children's learning once their children enter secondary school. Love, acceptance and a sense of being protected by parents can prevent children from negative things at school such as persecution and social anxiety (Leon-Moreno et al., 2020). The study also found that parental assertiveness had a positive relationship with abuse at school. On the other hand, studies by Li et al (2019);Prakhov et al (2020); Tan et al (2019) explain the impact of parental involvement on children's education. Next, parents and teachers should be involved in developing student discipline (Lumadi, 2019). However, (Li et al., 2019) found that strict discipline by parents has a negative relationship with academic achievement. As for the subtheme of influence on interest, parents were found to have a strong influence on the student's STEM career interests (Tey et al., 2020).

Benefits of Parental Involvement on Academic Attainment
Studies by Lumadi (2019) posited that parental involvement at home is positively related with academic achievement, however, parental involvement in school resulted in the opposite. This is in line with the findings of the Prakhov et al (2020) in which the act of inviting parents to school was found to have a negative impact on academic achievement.

Discussion
Based on the search results using keywords in the Scopus database, it was found that there are many studies that focus on parental involvement. It covers various aspects and levels such as influence in music, science, mathematics as well as primary school, secondary school and even college and university. Hence, it shows that this involvement is constantly being reviewed and does not stop at any one point or stage. In addition, past studies have also elaborated on the positive and negative effects of parental involvement on children and their education.
This systematic literature review focuses on the involvement of parents in secondary school and is limited to articles obtained from the Scopus database from 2019 to June 2021. 20 articles were shortlisted based on pre-determined criteria. Out of the 20 articles, 13 were quantitative, 5 qualitative, and the remaining 2 adopted a mixed method design. Half of the total articles were studies on parental support. This illustrates the importance of parental support for children's education regardless of the socio-economic status of the family. Studies by Tey et al (2020) Parent's relationship with the school is also one of the important aspects studied when it comes to matters related to parental involvement. This can be proven when six of the total twenty documents studied in this SLR paper linked the relationship of parents and the school to studies related to parental involvement. Therefore, parents and the school should establish a good relationship and be able to cooperate in all matters related to the education of the students. The communication aspect of the school with parents is also important as described in (Anastasiou & Papagianni, 2020).
The theme of socio-economic status is also associated with the involvement of parents in the education of their children. There are five documents in this SLR that highlighted the issue of socio-economic status and its relevance to the involvement of parents. Students who lacked learning resources were found to have lower motivation to learn (Fadiji, 2020). This indicates that limited financial resources can also influence the interest in learning. In addition, parents' SES also affects the level of attention their child gets in the classroom through contact with the teacher (Young, 2020). Similarly, this was explained in the study which found that parents with high SES were found to be more likely to contact teachers frequently when compared to other parents, resulting in their children being given more attention compared to their counterparts while in the classroom.
The effect of parental involvement on children's academic performance was the least discussed theme out of the entire studies included in the SLR, totalling up to only three studies. Although commonly, parental involvement is associated with a positive effect on children's academic achievement, undoubtedly, some studies found opposite relationship. Parental involvement in schools brings negative impact on academic achievement, while parental involvement at home has a positive impact (Lumadi, 2019). This finding is in line with a study by Thomas et al (2019) which suggested that parental involvement has a positive effect on students' learning as well as preventing them from repeating due to failure and dropouts.

Conclusion
This systematic review was carried out to identify the involvement of parents at the secondary school level. The documents collected are based on the Scopus database from January 2019 to June 2021 with a number of stipulations placed as criteria for inclusion and exclusion. Of the total 1,683 documents screened in the early stages, only twenty were included in the final stage of the survey. Findings show that the involvement of parents with school teachers and principals can improve students' achievement. In addition, family socio economic status (SES) also plays a significant role in ensuring students' achievement since provision of facilities and students' learning needs at home can influence students' academic success. Four main themes were obtained, namely parent relationship with teacher or principal or school, SES relationship with students' achievement, parental support and benefits of parental engagement towards academic achievement.
The themes that are frequently discussed in studies related to parental involvement, particularly in secondary schools, can be clearly seen through this systematic review. The PRISMA method assists researchers in conducting a systematic and focused analysis that allows them to justify the documents included and excluded during the study. It is hoped that the result of this systematic review will help readers and researchers better understand the concept of parental involvement in education.
Although parental involvement is often associated with student excellence in various fields, there are other findings which showed the opposite effect. The lack of discomfort among teachers as well as conflicts of jurisdiction and responsibility are among the examples of poor effects that can be concluded through this systematic review. However, this should not be used as an excuse for all stakeholders in education to completely disregard parental involvement; rather, it should be refined in order to achieve the goal of a win-win situation. An agreement can possibly be reached by taking into account the views of various parties and being tolerant towards different views, consequently forming a strong relationship between all relevant parties.

Recommendation
This study is limited to documents contained in the Scopus database for publication between 2019 and March 2021. Future studies can include more documents by expanding the scope of search based on longer publishing time periods and not limited to just one database. Subsequent studies can also examine the involvement of parents in primary and preschool schools to look at trends and identify the differences that exist in the aspect of parental involvement for each level of schooling.
Parental involvement is changing with the progression of time and technology, and it can take many different forms. Therefore, future studies need to identify different types of virtual parental involvement without having to rely solely on the physical presence of parents at school. Furthermore, the study's diverse themes are worth exploring in order to provide a clearer picture to the reader.