Parental Participation in Schools (html)

Parental Participation in Schools

Home-School agreements

Austria: Agreements among the school partners

Christine Kisser,
Federal Ministry of Education and Cultural Affairs (BMUK)

Hans Hofer
Teacher

Home-school agreements: general context

Legal basis

Teaching in Austrian schools must follow laws which are based on the Austrian constitution. As a result, the rights and obligations of the school partners (teachers, parents or guardians and pupils) are specified in great detail by law. They can be divided into:

individual rights and obligations; and
collective rights and obligations, i.e. those assumed by representatives of the school partners or their decision-making bodies.

Why agreements between the school and home?

Parents and their children are generally only aware of the legal provisions which have affected them directly. Information on the legal provisions produced by the Federal Ministry of Education and Cultural Affairs, schools inspectors and the Educational Institute, has helped parents become more aware of the laws. However, the growing awareness of the importance of parent and school responsibilities has increased interest in different forms of written agreements among teachers, parents and pupils.

Forms of agreement

The Austrian school system draws a clear distinction between:

the rights and obligations safeguarded by law; and
the agreements worked out between the school partners (which are open to termination).

Agreements by law are in writing which can be used against more powerful bodies in a social unit. Agreements between partners are a matter of tolerance. Since tolerance and related concessions can be terminated at any time, it is more difficult for parents or schools to insist that they will be observed or maintained. However, such "concessions" are felt to be very important. The following sections highlight examples of these formal and informal agreements.

Agreements by law (formal)

Early warning system

A recent amendment to the Austrian School Education Act ensures that:

".....If a pupil's performance would have to be assessed as unsatisfactory in a compulsory subject in the second term on the basis of previous performance, this should be notified to the parents or guardians immediately and discussed at a meeting with the form teacher or class teacher."

The aim of this early warning system is to promote agreements among parents, pupils and teachers with a view to the supportive encouragement of pupils and to avoid possible failure later at school. The formal design is a matter for the individual teacher, who is obliged to arrive at an agreement on the action to be taken. Parents receive a copy of the agreement.

In one general high school in Vienna, 80% of parents felt that the information about a serious decline in performance was given in good time. The following were found to be particularly helpful:

the admission that the information from their own children had not been sufficient;
the opportunity to discuss differing points of view;
advice on helping learning; and
arrangements for the supervision or close monitoring of their children.

However, parents criticised teachers' poor communication and skills in motivating their children. They felt teachers should avoid negative interactions with children and work more positively with them to advise and help.

At national level, there has been a clear reduction in the number of unsatisfactory marks since the introduction of the early warning system. Between school years 1995/96 and 1996/97, around 2,000 fewer pupils received unsatisfactory marks even though the school roll had risen by 5,000 pupils in 1996/97.

School programme

Until 1993, the curriculum and time allocations for each subject were prescribed. Some flexibility in time was then introduced, within certain limits, to enable schools to focus on certain subjects or introduce new ones if they wished. The decision to adopt a revised timetable must be taken by the school forum or school community committee i.e. the school's decision-making bodies, composed of elected representatives of parents, pupils and teachers.

In 1995, a project was introduced to undertake a radical review of the curriculum for secondary stage one. The main aim was to withdraw central guidelines and allow schools to develop a curriculum based on core subjects and a wider curriculum which took account of local needs and circumstances. All of the school partners were to be involved in deciding the content and organisation. A school programme was drawn up for the local planning and development work. This agreed school programme set out the basic educational focus and included details of:

school life in general;
outside contacts;
priorities for school development; and
a timescale and action plan to meet them.

In future, all schools will have to agree such a school programme with its partners. It will form the basis for school evaluation, with the internal evaluation also being carried out by all of the partners.

Personal responsibility

Austrian school law provides for a process of increasing responsibility for children until they reach the age of 19. From their 9th year at school (final compulsory year), young people can decide to attend or stop attending alternative subjects, report their own absences and agree to re-grading in a lower performance group with the parents' or guardians' knowledge.

The parents or guardians can write to the form teacher to renounce their responsibility for some or all of the matters listed in the law. This helps to prepare young people for the responsibilities they encounter on leaving school.

Agreements between partners (informal)

Integrated care for pupils needing special care in compulsory schools in Vienna

In general compulsory schools in Vienna, integrated care of pupils with behavioural difficulties is carried out by peripatetic advisory teachers and psychagogues (teachers with relevant additional psychological training). The aim is to promote communication structures in schools so that parents, pupils and teachers work together and can establish positive relationships which will help them collaborate.

If a child's behaviour means that s/he is unable to stay in the regular school system despite peripatetic care, the child may be referred by a supra-regional commission to the Special Educational Centre for Behaviourally Disturbed Children (SPZ) for long-term care. However, s/he will remain a pupil of the school as the aim is to re-integrate him or her, as soon as possible. At SPZ, the child receives small-group intensive teaching and therapeutic care from two teachers until social maturity develops and is equal to the demands of a large class (generally one to two years). In 1997/98, 4.7% of the 100,000 Viennese pupils in compulsory school attendance were involved with SPZ.

This form of care assumes that the children's disturbed behaviour is primarily a reaction to their environment, which is why parents have to be included in the provision. A working contract is drawn up with the parents and includes the child's attendance at SPZ and regular parental meetings. It does not set out expectations for the child's educational performance. However, the contract demonstrates that the difficulties are being taken seriously by the education authority and the parents and it helps justify the high costs of care where the teacher-pupil ratio is 1:3.

Agreements covering key aspects of the daily classroom routine

One general high school in Vienna established agreements among teachers, parents and pupils following a three-year project.

Year 1

The form teacher of the 6th school grade collected the impressions of:

teachers working with the class, covering

- pupils' behaviour

- attitude

performance; and

pupils, concerning

- teachers' weaknesses

- the help needed from teachers, parents and peers.

At a parent's evening, two pupils presented the results of the survey. This awareness of the expectations of teachers and pupils formed the basis for jointly-agreed rules.

Year 2

A questionnaire for pupils was issued during the 8th school grade to investigate to what extent the agreed rules were being followed. The results were encouraging in almost all areas, although they felt that:

teachers were not reviewing work on an hourly basis; and
pupils were still working best only when a test was imminent.

80% of the pupils felt that the agreements were worthwhile. However, they thought that there needed to be better monitoring of how closely teachers and pupils followed the agreed rules.

At the end of the year, parents completed a questionnaire to assess the impact of the agreement. The parents:

thought that rules and agreements were important;
felt that two aspects needed further negotiation

- social behaviour (handling conflict, tolerance and consideration)

- learning behaviour (educational aims, class aims, support);

asked what should be done if the agreed rules were broken and who was responsible; and
were uncertain what to do if they had a complaint.

Year 3

For the 9th school grade year, five basic rules were agreed on the basis of the conditions drawn up by the pupils. The rules were intended to promote a good atmosphere in the class and successful learning. The pupils also drew up and signed an agreement on their behaviour towards each other. At a parents' evening, the agreements and rules adopted were presented. The pupils also noted the help they wished from parents, for example:

having confidence in their child's abilities;
showing an interest in their child's work at school;
being ready to talk;
providing sufficient financial support; and
mediating in the event of problems with teachers.

The parents were less enthusiastic about formalising the rules as they:

saw such agreements as an infringement of their parental rights;
were sceptical about agreements as a workable basis for a daily classroom routine; and
already regarded their children as largely responsible for themselves.

To ensure the success of agreements such as this, regular monitoring is required so that results of self-assessment by each group match the assessments made by other school partners. A method which has already been tried and tested in practice is presented below.

The educational contract

As part of an EU-SOCRATES-COMENIUS II project, two teachers at a Viennese secondary school agreed an "educational contract" with the pupils. The aim of the project was to help the educational and social integration of pupils from socio-cultural, ethnic and religious minorities and those with special educational needs.

At the start of the school year, rules for learning in the class and individual behaviour are drawn up by the class. The rules formed an educational contract and were signed by the child, parents and class teacher, as illustrated in the table below.

Class rules

Date

I keep my desk tidy

I don't use bad language

I don't argue

I hand in my assignments punctually

I keep to the school rules and I do not wear any headgear

I attend classes punctually

I do not disturb the others

I help my fellow pupils

Drawing up of own rules

P = Pupil

T = Teacher

Every 2-3 weeks, each child assessed how well s/he had met the rules using the scale: met, met sometimes, not met. The teacher also assessed the pupil and discussed the results with him or her. This method was found to be particularly suitable for use by children with learning difficulties. The grid can be used over a period of time to identify changes in performance and is helpful in discussions with parents.

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