When our daughter was four, I started thinking about going back to work. However, my earlier career had been in journalism, and that profession was even then in the process of re-inventing itself. I had always been interested in education. My original career goal was to be an English teacher. I switched to journalism in college, though, because I heard it was like grammar boot camp. Yes, that prospect appealed to me, so I must be a grammar geek. Anyway, when our daughter was four, I decided to explore the option of a second career in teaching.

That fall, I went back to school. Also, I attended a national education association convention conveniently taking place in our region. I learned a lot, decided this was a profession I wanted to pursue, and was surprised. Actually, I was surprised by a lot of things. But being at an intersection between parenthood and my new profession, one thing in particular surprised me: the idea of many teachers that most parents are not interested in education ... and that those who are interested are helicopter parents. It is not a complimentary phrase. 

I'd never before heard those words used together, but I quickly surmised the meaning from context: "Helicopter parents," those who hover too closely over their children, prevent them from learning how to act independently and causing problems for teachers. Not an Oxford English Dictionary definition, but it will do.

It was in one of the breakout sessions at the education convention that I first heard the term, and when it came time for the Q&A, I raised my hand. "Um, my question is really more of a comment." Long, pregnant pause. "I think I may be a helicopter parent." It felt like a confession.

The speaker was embarrassed, but not because she had used the phrase. She said she was embarrassed, because she did not know parents who weren't professional educators were in the audience. She hadn't meant us to hear that, but she had meant it.

In my education classes, I was also surprised. Because I was enrolled in a master's degree program, my fellow students were those working toward alternative certification and those already employed as teachers, many of them in educational leadership programs, hoping to work their way up in the school administration hierarchy. To my surprise, when I raised the issue of parental involvement, most (no exaggeration here) of my classmates in multiple classes told me not one  of the parents (again, no exaggeration) of children in their classrooms was interested in educational issues.

"Not one?" I would ask. "Surely there is at least one interested parent?" Like me, I was thinking. 

My purpose here is not to resolve the tension between the idea that no parents are interested and the concept of helicopter parents. I have long ago learned that humans are ambiguous creatures fully capable of living comfortably with various contradictory beliefs. My purpose here is to consider the value of parental involvement in children's education.

Not that I'm a big supporter of the No Child Left Behind Act, but one thing I think the government did get right there was the provision that schools are required to make parents partners in the educational process. The reason for that provision, of course, is that research has shown children's academic success is often positively correlated with parental involvement in their schooling. 

Mind you, my ten-year-old isn't convinced. The other day, we were driving somewhere, making conversation, and I started talking about teaching her something. Interrupting me mid-sentence, she declared, "You're not my teacher. You're my mother." She reconsidered a moment, then added, "Okay, so you're going to be a teacher, but you're not my teacher" (emphasis on "my").  To no avail, I tried telling her it is part of the parental job to teach children. I taught her to eat solid food, to drink out of a sippy cup and to sleep in a big girl bed, for example. She refused to agree with me that parents are teachers. 

Perhaps I am indulging in a fantastic utopian dream, but I think it is a relatively modest one. In my utopia, my daughter will finally be convinced that I am a teacher. Her teacher. She will come to believe this, because parents and other community members will be actively involved in public school education. She will come to believe that we are teachers, because teaching and the home and the community will be integrated. Because we parents will fully support the teachers and the learning that takes place at school. And because the teachers will admit us -- even those of us who have confessed to being helicopter parents -- as partners in education.