Previous research has shown that home-school cooperation is beneficial for children’s learning and development as well as children’s social functioning and it assists in addressing problem behaviours (e.g.  Cox 2005; Pomerantz, Moorman, & Litwack 2007; Wilder 2014; Rimm-Kaufman, Pianta, Cox, & Bradley, 2003). Although researchers note the benefits of the cooperation, there are barriers to cooperation (e.g. Hornby & Rafaele 2011). For example, teachers, parents and children can have different views of what is included in the cooperation. In this presentation, we will focus on teachers’ views.

Home-school cooperation in Europe is facing new challenges. In 2015 Europe experienced a record influx of immigrants and asylum seekers. Children of the immigrant families will start schooling and their homes will become participants in the home-school cooperation. However, it can be anticipated that cooperation with people from different cultural backgrounds is not without challenges. Even in the USA with a long history of integrating people with different backgrounds immigrant parents face barriers in home-school cooperation (Turney & Kao,2009). When focussing immigrant/refugee parents the previous research often explains barriers to cooperation as due to deficits in parents, such as parents’ lack of competencies, motivation, knowledge of the educational system, language problems to name just a few. Interpreting the home culture different from the home culture of the teachers as “wrong” or “inadequate” does not offer a good starting point for parental involvement (Linde Matthiesen 2016) Moreover, as some researchers point out, a challenge for the good relationship is the fact that schools offer one model of good parenting and are not sensitive to the ideas of those parents who do not fit this model (Huijbregts, Leseman, & Tavecchio, 2008).  In addition, as noted in a study by Baeck (2010), teachers can experience parental involvement, especially by well-educated and resourceful parents, as a threat to their position and professional authority. Yet teachers are powerful actors in parental involvement with a power and position to either enhance involvement or discourage it (Baeck 2010

In defining what is included in parental involvement, the most influential model used both in research and practice has been the Epstein model (e.g. Epstein, Sanders, Simon, Salinas, Jansorn, & Van Voorhis, 2009).  Included in the features of the model are positive home conditions, communication, involvement at school, home learning activities, shared decision making within the school, and community partnerships (Epstein, 1995; Epstein et al., 2009). In this study, Epstein’s model was used as a starting point in interviews where teachers were asked to tell what home-school cooperation is from their point of view.

One of the identified factors hindering cooperation are different beliefs of what is included in parental involvement or cooperation. Teachers’ beliefs play an important role in either enhancing or discouraging parental involvement (e.g. Hoover-Dempsey, Walker, Jones, & Reed, 2002).

This small-scale pilot study seeks to answer the question: How home-school cooperation is defined by the teachers participating in the study?

As sub-questions included are questions such as the following: How much and what kind of cooperation in needed for the beneficial effects, initiated by whom, should parents help with homework, is there a gap between the rhetoric and reality, what is the purpose and aim of home-school cooperation, can there be too much involvement, what is the role of children in home-school cooperation.

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