An Evaluation of School-Community Partnership between Residents and Elementary School Parents

Abstract

  The purpose of this study was to explore and evaluate the structure of School Community-Partnerships between residents and parents. We used the School Community-Partnership Scale (Koizumi 2000), Awareness of School-Support Volunteers Scale (Iwasaki 2011), and Expectations for School Education and Perception about Educational Systems. Residents' (N＝166) and parents' (N＝233) data were paired from 3 elementary school districts in Joetsu in Niigata prefecture.
  A factor structure pool of School Community-Partnership was evaluated using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. As expected, the results yielded and supported 3 factors (GFI＝0.941, CFI＝0.937, RMSEA＝0.058). Variance analysis revealed that the attributes of the school districts were found to interact strongly with “Human Interaction” (p＜0.01). Cluster analysis proved the differences of awareness between residents and parents about School-Support Volunteers and Expectations for School Education. The Educational Systems related to School Community-Partnerships were not known by residents and parents except for After-School Care for Children.