Parental Engagement
The Careers and Enterprise Company & Cheshire and Warrington Pledge Partnership Parental Research Findings
The Cheshire and Warrington Pledge Partnership and Careers Enterprise Company has been working on capturing Parental Engagement Research to help inform educators and employers about supporting both young people and parents.
The research has shown:
Parents and carers have significant influence on their child’s career decision making. Careers guidance is key to social mobility by providing young people – whatever their background – with the skills and information they need to make good decisions about their best next step.
Is your Parental Engagement working?
Schools in Cheshire and Warrington have told us that parental engagement is one of their biggest challenges, especially in areas of high deprivation– exactly where the young people need the most support- from parents and others.
The Cheshire and Warrington Careers Hub conducted localised research, funded by the Careers and Enterprise Company, to try to identify some of the challenges and barriers that parents and carers are facing accessing Careers information locally, so that schools could take this (and other research and resources) in to account when communicating with parents and carers.
This research highlighted:
- Awareness of careers options and support services is the first hurdle
- There’s a disconnect between what parents know and what they want
- Low awareness and perception of engagement with school careers officers
- Perceptions of next steps for their children are limited
- Conversation goes beyond communications
Parental Engagement Resources
It’s not that schools aren’t communicating, it’s that the communications are not landing with impact for the parents and carers, so schools need to carefully consider their messages and how they are communicating moving forward.
There is an Executive Summary available for this research HERE, as well as resources to support schools in better engaging with parents and carers such as Talking Futures | CEC Resource Directory which can be accessed HERE.
Get In Touch