Effective parent-teacher partnerships improve outcomes for autistic students. Yet, we know little about what effective partnerships look like for parents of autistic children from different backgrounds. We conducted interviews with 17 Chinese parents of autistic children attending Australian kindergartens/schools to understand their experiences.…

Parents' beliefs, values and associated everyday practices can play an influential role in their children's educational environment. This paper reports on a subsection of data from a larger qualitative study on how immigrant parents' cultural beliefs, values and everyday practices contributed to shaping their young children's early engagement in…

Internal dissonance and disagreement with significant others over career goals can disrupt career progress. Based on goal setting and self-regulation theories, this study tested the relationships between self and parent career goal discrepancy (gap between what is desired and what is achieved) and career goal adjustment (career compromise and goal…

Effective parent-teacher partnerships can improve outcomes for autistic students. Yet, we know little about what effective partnerships look like for parents of autistic children from diverse backgrounds. Using participatory methods, we conducted semi-structured interviews with 15 Somali mothers of autistic children attending Australian…

This paper argues that a component of increasing the rate of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and youths completing their secondary education is having parents and teachers maintain heightened expectations of these children in achieving this goal. To understand this phenomenon, we investigate the importance of, and discrepancies…

This research used the responses of 187 Tasmanian teachers to a questionnaire comprising 52-Likert-type items, two multiple-choice items, and two open-response items to investigate differences in teachers' beliefs about aspects of schooling related to students' secondary school completion. Exploratory factor analysis of responses to the…

The underlying thesis of much popular parenting discourse in circulation in western Anglophone countries is that parenting labour has intensified historically, notably in regard to schooling, and that we are witnessing new kinds of parental attitudes and strategies. A related argument holds that parents, especially middle-class parents, have…

This paper examines factors affecting parental expectations of higher education prospects for their children using Australian household survey data. We find that a variety of factors influence parental expectations, of which parents' assessment of their children's academic performance is the strongest. Factors known to impact upon actual higher…

In this paper, I draw on a qualitative study of Iraqi-born Muslim mothers in Australia exploring how they navigate choosing secondary schools for their daughters. While the mothers interviewed for this study agreed on the importance of education and its role in facilitating upward social mobility for all their children, they articulated a specific…

This paper is based on research into the destinations and aspirations of school leavers in Australia. It investigates the relationship between the transition to university for different groups of students and their own and their parents' and teachers' expectations. It draws on Bourdieu, Boudon, Nussbaum and others to investigate the way young…

Across the globe, from the very wealthy continents of North America to Europe to Australia, the phenomenon of migrant and immigrant students outperforming native students are observed and documented. Even within the same race, achievement differences are being observed. What might account for the achievement success of one group of students over…

Across the globe, from the very wealthy continents of North America to Europe to Australia, the phenomenon of migrant and immigrant students outperforming native students are observed and documented. Some migrants and immigrants from China, the Philippines, India, Russia, Africa, and the Caribbean are reportedly achieving higher test scores than…

As sites of human social activity, schools must engage in challenging conversations between staff, students and their communities about social disharmonies. This paper presents interview data from a case study of Eucalyptus High School (not its real name), a large multicultural school located in a middle-class area in suburban Victoria…

This article explores parents' use of private tutoring services for their primary school children in Sydney, Australia's largest city. Using Bernstein's theories of invisible and visible pedagogies, we look, through the eyes of a small group of middle-class Chinese-background interviewees, at the tensions between certain pedagogic forms associated…

The literature on the immigrant-native educational achievement gap is suggestive of a better performance of immigrant students in countries practising selective immigration policies. However, the origin of such differences has not been investigated. I considered both important observed characteristics as well as the role of unobservables in the…