Third Parties in Home-School Connections: Learning from Conversations with Nondominant Families Crossing Cultures

Guided by a networked model of Ecological Systems Theory, this qualitative study listened to nondominant families who had crossed cultures and sent children to schools in cultural contexts different from those of the parents’ upbringing. Researchers looked at the mesosystemic interactions between the microsystems of the family and the microsystems of the school through the eyes of the families in order to capture “third parties” and common patterns of social relations and interactions that families engaged in around school. Families insisted on keeping home and school settings separate and revealed complex social networks that mediated families’ thinking about school and motivated alternative conceptions of their involvement in their children’s education. Implications are discussed.