The conference is discussing the state of parental involvement in education in Europe and focuses on how such involvement is leading to the parents’ own lifelong learning journey.
The conference brings to a close the Parent Empowerment for Family Literacy (PEFaL) Project that was lead by FES in collaboration with the participating partner countries, namely Belgium, England, Italy, Lithuania, and Romania, with the support of the European Commission in the framework Grundtvig 1 strand of the Socrates Programme.
Parents are continual learners since there are no limits or boundaries to education, Nora Macelli, CEO of FES, emphasised. She pointed out that through PEFaL parents have made transnational communication enabling them to work directly and bring forward any concepts. As parents become involved with PEFaL to participate in programmes to support their child’s learning, they realise they have become learners. Listed on the Ministry of Education website are 1,500 adult education courses in a Directory of Learning Opportunities in Malta.
The role parents have in the education of their children necessitates life-long learning. Prof. Wain, chairman of FES, spoke about the crucial function education and training has in preparing “students who will be lifelong learners”.
Ms. Macelli stressed the importance of further involving fathers in their children’s education. In Malta, fathers only make up three per cent of parents FES has worked with. In the UK, the figure is stated to be “well under 10 per cent”. Locally, the programme seems to boil down to four factors. Pre-programme meetings for parents are normally held by the FES during working hours, or the programmes are delivered at an inconvenient time of day and clash with working hours. The child’s education is often perceived to be the mother’s domain, with the father acting as a looker-on. Some fathers’ lack of interest stems from no previous experience of participation in group-based educational activities.
Minister for Education Dr Galea said the educational landscape in Malta was changing. Whereas before school and home were seen as separate entities, present studies show that through collaboration, all stakeholders benefit from the experience. The parents’ involvement improves the child’s morals, attitudes and academic achievements while promoting better behaviour and social attitude as well. This in turn would lead to a wider social effect, minimising the risk of the child becoming an emotional failure or marginalised and leaving school.
In 1999, the Literacy Unit of the University of Malta was commissioned by the Curriculum Department of the Education Division to carry out a literacy study with six-year-old students. It was found that approximately 14 per cent of the 5,000 year 2 student population (from State, church and independent schools) were found to need additional help in Maltese and 25 per cent of the same student population were found to need additional help in English. On the other hand, Dr. Galea pointed out, when the same situation was reassessed last year using the same students, the results showed that out of this 5,000 year 5 population, approximately 4.5 per cent (225 students) of them needed additional help in Maltese and 8.5 per cent (425) of the same cohort need additional help in English.