Campus Review Vol 29. Issue 10 October 2019 | Seite 21

industry & research
campusreview.com.au
Parental
guidance
Monash study looks at how
migrant parents influence their
children’s study choices.
By Kate Prendergast
W
hen immigrant families arrive
in Australia, they will often
find a whole new world
of educational opportunity for their
children. Yet with increased opportunities
can come increased expectations.
At the same time, an unfamiliar
educational system can be tricky to
understand and navigate, especially
for non-native speakers – which
can limit parents’ involvement in the
home-schooling partnership.
These are some of the findings of new
research from Monash University, in which
the influence of immigrant parents on
what subjects their children take in the
final years of high school is explored.
Published in the International Journal
for Educational and Vocational Guidance,
the study looked at 12 parents and 12
children, the latter of whom were in
Years 10–12 in Melbourne public schools.
All were from a lower socioeconomic
bracket, with the majority of families
from Asian or European backgrounds.
In a handful of cases, parents had a
tendency to live vicariously through their
offspring. Anxious that their children follow
career pathways denied to themselves,
the parents pressured them to enrol in
high-level STEM subjects like maths and
science, which didn’t necessarily align
with their children’s ambitions or abilities.
“Educational leaders highlighted
concerns about situations when parents
forced children to choose a particular
subject, especially mathematics, which
had implications for placing students at risk
of not meeting entry scores required for
their chosen university pathway,” says lead
researcher Dr Sarika Kewalramani, from
Monash University’s Faculty of Education.
“This study argues that students’ subject
choice is a complex interplay of parents’
beliefs and expectations that can stem
from their past educational memories
and frustrated career ambitions.”
Speaking with Campus Review,
Kewalramani said that even the career
counsellors she talked to in her research
admitted that parents could be overly
adamant about ensuring their child pursued
the most challenging path – “regardless
of what the teacher has recommended”.
Yet, contrary to the abundant
stereotypes of “tiger mums” and “pushy
immigrant parents”, the majority of
parents interviewed did not dictate their
children’s educational pathways. Instead,
they preferred to allow them to make
autonomous decisions about their subjects
and careers, while still maintaining high
expectations of academic performance.
Parental influence, the study found,
is overall far more subtle. Rather than
having their study options openly dictated,
children will often internalise the values,
beliefs and expectations of their parents
around what is important in education.
It is this transferal which can be the
most powerful steering mechanism.
Even if families arrived in Australia from
cultures that placed significant decision-
making powers in the hands of guardians,
these philosophies were found to shift
over time. This, the research surmised,
could be a result of acculturation to an
Australian context, with a broader range
of lucrative career trajectories available.
“Coming from Bangladesh, [my mother]
always wanted me to do medicine or
something,” said Meher, the son of Ishi.
“But over time, she became accepting,
like do whatever you want. We just talk
about what is the best for the future.
What I am going to be happy with.”
This change was mirrored in the
comments of Michelina, who moved to
Australian from the Czech Republic in 2004:
“During my school days back in
Czechoslovakia, it was a very regimented
maths-driven, science-driven curriculum,
at the expense of humanities and
languages. But here in Australia, [my
son] Nick is absolutely free to pursue
whatever he wants. I do not push him.”
Kewalramani said the study’s findings
“reinforced the significant value of
acculturation that required parents to
adapt to the needs of their children
and let go of the past educational
experiences and cultural beliefs they had
in their countries prior to migration”.
She also found that a limited
understanding of the Australian education
system, compounded by language
barriers, compromised parents’ abilities
to provide guidance to their children.
Better partnerships need to be created
between schools, universities and
immigrant parents, she said, so as not
to exclude parents from helping guide
their children’s educational journey. It
would also ease the pressure on school
counsellors, many of whom are having
to make do without the appropriate
tools or strategies to help parents
understand the education system better.
The earlier these conversations happen,
the better, Kewalramani believes. At Monash
University open days, she makes a point
of actively welcoming parents to take
a look at the broad range of study and
career options available. This year, Monash
distributed flyers at schools for the sole
purpose of bringing parents with children
in Years 9–10 to attend these open days.
“Parental education needs to
start from when they arrive into the
country,” Kewalramani says.
“These parents have struggled –
they hold onto their own educational
histories and memories – but we need
to get this message out there: young
children have the capacity to make those
decisions together with parents.” ■
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