Academic failure and success, the distribution of rewards and opportunites, the reaities of ability versus expectation, the burdens of accepting responsibility and experiencing competition-all these are the stressful forces that surround the relations of the school with its parental community, then as now. The school- community relationship should strive to be an equal partnership with a full sharing of concerns, as well as risks and benefits. Schools invite parents to participate in advisory committees. However, the parents chosen may not accurately represent the parent population and they may not have any real power in these committees. Participation can empower parents towardbecoming more actively involved in teaching their own children, and more receptive of parent leadership training toward the improvement of their home-based teaching skills.
Parents are passive participants of one way, school's viewpoint originates.
Active - Parents take on the role of a more active and coequal teaching partner. Schools are currently attempting to move away from the more traditional parent roles to the more emergent model. In the emergent model, parents are seen as partners in the education of children, not as adversaries. Most important in this model are the ideas of the school-parent relationship as responsive, open, participative and active, as highlighted above. If schools can move towards this more emergent form of parent involvement, they will undoubtedly see and increase in their students' academic success.