PARENTING STYLES AND STUDENTS EDUCATIONAL ATTAINMENTS IN SELECTED PUBLIC SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN LWENGO DISTRICT, UGANDA.

ABSTRACT The present study was intended to find out the relationship between Parenting styles and students’ educational attainments in four selected public secondary schools in Lwengo district. Spec~flc objectives were to establish the relationshz~ between Parenting styles and students’ educational attainments in public secondary schools which included , To investigate the influence of parents’ participation in school meetings onto the Students’ educational attainments, To assess how parents payment of facilitation fee influences Students’ educational attainments, To examine the influence of parents’ provision of scholastic materials on Students’ educational attainments in public secondary schools in Lwengo district The study adopted a cross sectional survey that based on both quantitative and qualitative research approaches in collecting, recording, analyzing and interpreting data of the study. Questionnaires were carefully designed, written down and tested Open and close-ended questions which were asked to individual respondents which included Students, Teachers, and school administrators to gather information in research. Interview guide was also adopted by the researcher to collect data from ministry ofeducation and sports officials about social life following the set objectives and thus is regarded as a systematic enquiry. These instruments were used to measure the relationshzp between Parenting styles and Students’ educational attainments were administered to form four 175 Students ,76 Teachers,22 School Administrators, 25 Board of governors, 10 Ministry of Education and sports in Four Selected Public Secondary Schools in Lwengo District and they were selected using simple random sampling technique. Spearman ‘.s rank order correlation was used to test the three hypotheses. The findings of the study indicated that: The study found out that there is needfor parents ‘participation in school meetings that leads to good students ‘educational attainments. According to the study, it was realized that failure ofpaying facilitation fees payment on time, leads to students absenteeism from school hence affecting their education attainments. The study found out that provision of scholastic materials has an effect on the educational attainments of students. The study concluded that; that failure in paying students ‘facilitationfees leads to poor achievement as many are absentfrom school, missing studies in Lwengo District. Parents ‘failure to provide necessary scholastic materials leads to poor achievement as many students depend heavily on schools and yet public schools do not have enough necessary teaching and learning materials. It was recommended thalsirict measures must be put in place by the District Educational Officer~ which can enforce parents to fully participate in the academic affairs of their children, Head teachers, Board of governors should clearly state and explain to parents about the necessity of teaching and learning materials to boost the students’ educational attainments. Uganda as a country and Lwengo district policies must continue to encourage the development of school-family community partnershzps as an essential component of larger school improvement effort, Regular sensitization meetings and community non-formal education classes should be organized within Lwengo District to inform parents about the value ofeducation to children, the community and the nation. This would be a way ofencouraging them to be active in the Parent Teacher Associations, Board ofGovernors as well as the activities in the schools.