
Annual Parent Survey 2017
Our Annual Parent Survey provides a snapshot of parents’ views about a range of issues relating to their child’s education and school life.
The large scale of the survey offers a significant and unique insight into what parents – key stakeholders in education – truly think about their child’s schooling.
Social mobility
For a country to have good social mobility, it means that a person’s socio-economic background should not be a key determinant in their academic and career outcomes. Currently, children from a disadvantaged background in the UK are on average out-performed academically by their better-off peers, leading to narrower career pathways and employment options, so that the disadvantage lasts a lifetime and is perpetuated down the generations. The government has introduced measures in early years and schools to promote social mobility to help more disadvantaged children to achieve better outcomes.
As part of our survey, we asked parents about their awareness of social mobility initiatives in school, as well as about the expectations they hold for their child’s future. This has become topical because, until very recently, each new generation’s income grew relative to their parents’. But now, generational income growth has stopped, and parents’ expectations that their child’s quality of life will be better than theirs are no longer being met.
What we asked
We found out from parents:
- How they support their child’s learning
- Whether or not their child’s school does enough to provide all pupils with the opportunity to succeed in life
- What their expectations for their child’s future are
What parents told us
We discovered that:
- Only 56% believe their child’s school is doing enough to provide pupils with opportunities to succeed in life
- 48% are also concerned about whether their child currently receives a better quality of education than they did
- 52% believe their child’s career prospects are better than their own
- 36% are concerned their child’s school is not preparing them for the modern-day job market
Our findings show that parents lack confidence that their child’s school is doing enough to help disadvantaged pupils, and there is also pessimism about their child’s career prospects. However, Parentkind believes that there is huge potential to turn this around. Parental engagement in a child’s education has been proven to improve both academic achievement and overall school experience for all children: parents being positively involved in education can help promote upward social mobility.
School funding
From previous surveys, we know that in recent times, schools have been looking at measures to save costs and make their budgets go further. We also know that more and more parents have been asked to make voluntary monthly contributions to the school fund, and that the numbers doing so are increasing. This is in spite of rising parental concern about the cost of their child attending school.
Our research provides significant insight into key school funding issues such as:
- The proportion of parents who think the cost of educating their child is increasing, as well as the number concerned by those costs
- The main financial concerns parents have in paying for their child’s schooling
- The proportion of parents approached by school for a voluntary financial contribution, as well as the number subsequently making regular donations
- The amount parents are willing to donate to their child’s school
- The percentage of donating parents who know how the school uses their financial contribution
- The measures proposed or implemented by schools to cut costs, and which ones parents most strongly support
In conclusion
As the report shows, it’s possible to draw some key conclusions about parents’ views on school funding, including that:
- Parents are increasingly concerned about the cost of sending a child to school
- Parents are donating to their school fund in greater numbers, but with strong regional variations between their willingness to contribute as well as the amount they are willing to provide
- Parents and schools favour different cost-cutting measures, but with some agreement
- There is a clear top three in terms of the cost implications that concern parents the most