Even though relationships between educational institutions and parents/guardians during their children’s post-school academic years might be distant, it appears that family involvement is increasingly spreading into higher levels of education as many parents/guardians strive to contribute to and become involved in their children’s university experience (Wintre & Yaffe, 2000; Lynk Wartman & Savage, 2008). Given this shift, it becomes important to investigate the cultural constructions and meanings associated with the phenomenon of family involvement in higher education, particularly given higher education’s increasing cost and significance in an individual’s life opportunities. This paper presents the pilot findings of a larger research study[1], which investigates whether (and if so, the extent to which) families are involved in undergraduate students’ university education and how that might shape students’ academic experiences in Cyprus. This study focuses on investigating the perspective of the main actors in the phenomenon (academic and administrative staff, undergraduate students and their families) in an effort to investigate in depth the rationale, nature, and understandings of family involvement in higher education in Cyprus. For the purposes of the study, ‘family involvement’ was meant to signify any type of involvement from member(s) of a student’s family in any matter associated with the student’s university studies with the intent of supporting them. The term ‘family’ referred to one’s partner, guardian, or adult(s) with whom one is biologically related.

[1] 2013-15; Familyinvolvementinhighereducation (principal investigator Lamprianou, I., Department of Social and Political Sciences, University of Cyprus; Internal Research Projects, Research Committee, University of Cyprus

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