Perception of Principals and Parents on Parental Involvement in Managing Students’ Indiscipline in Secondary Schools in Rivers East Senatorial District: Counselling Implications

The paper investigated the perception of principals and parents on parental involvement in managing students' indiscipline in secondary schools in Rivers East Senatorial District with a focus on the counselling implications. Three research questions and three corresponding null hypotheses guided the study. The study adopted a survey design. The population of the study comprised all the principals and parents in the 107 public senior secondary schools in the District. A sample of 152 respondents (54 principals and 98 parents) was drawn through a multi-staged sampling procedure. A researcher developed an instrument titled "Parental Involvement in the Management of Students' Indiscipline Questionnaire" (PIMSIQ), which was used for data collection. Three experts in the Department of Educational Psychology, Guidance and Counselling from the University of Port Harcourt validated the instrument. A reliability coefficient of 0.91 was obtained using Cronbach's alpha statistics. Data collected were analysed using mean and standard deviation, and the hypotheses were tested at 0.05 level of significance using the z-test. Findings from the study revealed that the causes of indiscipline among students in secondary schools include peer influence, poor parental upbringing, and weak school rules, among others. Parents perceive that their involvement in managing students' indiscipline will interfere with the school policy and make the students unwilling to change. The study also showed that rehabilitative counselling and creating a fascinating learning environment can be helpful in managing students' indiscipline. Based on the findings, it was recommended, among others, that parents and school authorities should interact regularly and formally on how to manage acts of indiscipline among students.