Mission Possible? Institutional Family-School-Community Partnership Practices and Parental Involvement in Hungarian Majority and Minority Schools in Three Central and Eastern European Countries

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This study is one of the best that I have reviewed in the last several years. It 

was easy to follow, the literature review was solid and well referenced, and the Methods 

Section was solid and logical. The presentation of the Results Section was

objective and helpful. The Discussion section was well thought out. Great job!

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,
We are sincerely grateful for your efforts and your constructive review. We are very pleased that you consider our manuscript to be of high quality and suitable for further progression.
Sincerely,
Authors

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Review for the paper

Mission Possible? Institutional Family-School-Community Partnership Practices and Parental Involvement in Three Central and Eastern European Countries

Submitted in Social Sciences, January 2025

Dear authors,

it was very interesting to read your carefully written and elaborated study about parents. The literature review was done really good, although sometimes the reference is a little bit vague as pages are missing to identify the citation. For example, in the case of the German written publication of Killus & Paseka which you cited not correctly and without giving a page to which you refer. Besides, there are English written publications of the authors available – that would be more informative for an international audience.

 The research questions are formulated very clear, also the hypotheses.

However, the chosen und used sample does not go in line with the headline. The headline promises a comparison between three Central and Eastern European Countries. The reader has to wait till the methodology chapter to get more information. On the way, it was astonishing that you used only literature from Hungary to support your argumentation. What you really did (and this you made transparent not before presenting the results): You asked Hungarian people living in Hungary (as part of the majority), and Hungarian people living in Romania and the Ukraine (where they are part of a minority). Attention: That is not what you announced in the headline°! Here the reviewer was very astonished. The announcement is not fulfilled. I would recommend to make your title 'nearer to the truth' and make transparent at an earlier stage of the paper whom you really asked and what you want to compare. That would be more honest. I would recommend to say what you really did and give reasons. Why? Minorities are always in a special situation, so some results have to be explained, eg the high rate of children in private schools. How does the situation differ in the three parts of the sample? And how many children attend private schools when they do not belong to the minority? Perhaps, there is no difference, but anyway, it has to be discussed.

In the description of the instruments, you did not give details how you defined home-based and school-based PI. However, in the existing literature several definitions exist. You cited Borgonovi & Montt (2012). Did you use their categories or other ones? Perhaps you can add some examples for the both categories. In table 2 there are no differences between parents from a different financial background concerning home-based PI, however, the wealthiest are more involved in school-based PI. In Table 4 the financial situation of the parents is not relevant. Please give explanation.

In the final chapter you refer to international literature, which is usual and might be interesting, however, please rethink in which cases such a comparison makes sense. Here an example (line 515): “Our results indicated that not all dimensions differ across parents by their level of education, similar to a previous study (Chappel and Ratliffe 2021).” However, the study you give here as reference was carried out in Hawaii in elementary schools. Please give reasons why this reference is used by you and makes sense.

At the end you generalize your results (line 600). Is that correct? “FSCP practices relate differently to different groups of parents, specifically in Central and Eastern Europe where low-SES parents are especially in need of help due to entrenched social inequalities.”

To sum up: your paper is well written and elaborated, however, some improvements must be done. I think it would be worthwhile in doing so.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

We are sincerely grateful for your efforts and your constructive and thoughtful reviews. We are very pleased that you consider our manuscript to be of high quality and suitable for further progression with the suggested revisions and minor changes. Thank you for pointing out areas where the article could be further improved. We have carefully addressed your comments and made the necessary corrections. You can find here a summary of the changes:

Comment 1: However, the chosen and used sample does not go in line with the headline. The headline promises a comparison between three Central and Eastern European Countries. The reader has to wait till the methodology chapter to get more information. On the way, it was astonishing that you used only literature from Hungary to support your argumentation. What you really did (and this you made transparent not before presenting the results): You asked Hungarian people living in Hungary (as part of the majority), and Hungarian people living in Romania and the Ukraine (where they are part of a minority). Attention: That is not what you announced in the headline°! Here the reviewer was very astonished. The announcement is not fulfilled. I would recommend to make your title 'nearer to the truth' and make transparent at an earlier stage of the paper whom you really asked and what you want to compare. That would be more honest. I would recommend to say what you really did and give reasons. Why? Minorities are always in a special situation, so some results have to be explained, eg the high rate of children in private schools. How does the situation differ in the three parts of the sample? And how many children attend private schools when they do not belong to the minority? Perhaps, there is no difference, but anyway, it has to be discussed."

Response 1: We have revised the title to clarify that our sample was not drawn from the entire student population of three countries but specifically from the Hungarian-speaking student population. The focus on Hungarian-speaking students across different education systems allows for a more consistent comparison of the influence of individual-level (pupil, family) and institutional characteristics on parental involvement, without the risk of translation distortions and misinterpretation. Among both minority and majority students, 96% of those attending private schools attend a church school.  Churches have a relatively stronger network of schools in the regions surveyed. We have expanded the literature review by including additional research antecedents and references on the parental involvement of Hungarian students in Central and Eastern European countries.

Comment 2: "In the description of the instruments, you did not give details how you defined home-based and school-based PI. However, in the existing literature several definitions exist. You cited Borgonovi & Montt (2012). Did you use their categories or other ones? Perhaps you can add some examples for the both categories."

Response 2: In this section, we have now included clear definitions of home- and school-based parental involvement, with specific examples to illustrate these concepts.

Comment 3 "In table 2 there are no differences between parents from a different financial background concerning home-based PI, however, the wealthiest are more involved in school-based PI. In Table 4 the financial situation of the parents is not relevant. Please give explanation."

Response 3 We have provided a detailed explanation of why parents' financial situation had differing effects as presented in Tables 2 and 4. Table 2 (bivariate analysis) shows that parents' financial situation is an important factor in the intensity of parental involvement when examined without considering other contextual factors. However, when controlling for other variables, this relationship becomes insignificant. Specifically, FSCP policies provided by the school and perceived by parents can override the impact of financial inequalities on PI.

Comment 4 "In the final chapter you refer to international literature, which is usual and might be interesting, however, please rethink in which cases such a comparison makes sense. Here an example (line 515): “Our results indicated that not all dimensions differ across parents by their level of education, similar to a previous study (Chappel and Ratliffe 2021).” However, the study you give here as reference was carried out in Hawaii in elementary schools. Please give reasons why this reference is used by you and makes sense."

Response 4 We agree that one of the references to Chappel and Ratliffe's 2021 article was not suitable in the first part of the discussion, and we canceled it. Citing this research is more appropriate in another section of the Discussion, as it highlights effective family outreach strategies in diverse socioeconomic contexts, emphasizing that personalized and informal communication methods are particularly effective.

Comment 5 "At the end you generalize your results (line 600). Is that correct? “FSCP practices relate differently to different groups of parents, specifically in Central and Eastern Europe where low-SES parents are especially in need of help due to entrenched social inequalities.”

Response 5 We have refined our conclusions to clarify that our findings are not generalizable to entire countries but are specific to the parents included in our sample.

Once again, we thank you for your valuable suggestions, which have contributed to improving the quality of our manuscript. We respectfully submit the revised version for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Authors

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper was carefully revised and the recommendations used for improving. Congratulations!