The relative effects of family socio-economic characteristics on participation in education in Turkey

Problem Statement: In the last half of the century, the discrepancy in primary school graduation between the developed and developing countries has continually narrowed, while the discrepancy in the rates of secondary completion have widened. Debates on policies and analyses are on the worldwide increase in order to determine and prevent the impediments to increasing school participation rates at the post-compulsory, education stages. According to the results of related research, there is a strong relationship between children's participation in education and their family's socio-economic variables. Parents' level of education and family income are stated to be significant variables in participation in education and to correlate strongly with other socio-economic variables. Purpose of Study: This study aims to determine the effect of family variables, which play a role in school attendance among the population between the ages of 15-18 by gender and place of residence. Methods: This study is of an analytical nature. The dependent variable for the analytical data analysis is binary and cross-sectional. For the nature of the data, the Binary Logistic regression was employed to analyze the nature of the effect of independent variables on the dependent variable. The dependent variable in this research is the student. The independent variables are the father's level of education, mother's level of education, size of the household, and level of income. Findings and Results: Parents' level of education, household size, and level of income are variables, which affect children's participation in education. However, there are differences in the effects of the family variables in the child attending school. For example, the father's level of education shows the highest effect and the level of income shows the lowest effect. The family variables have a particularly high effect on girls' participation in education. It can be said that the positive developments in the family variables play an important role in girls going to school. The parents being elementary school graduates show the maximum effect in the child's attendance to school. The size of the household being 4 or fewer members has a marginal effect on the child going to school. Similarly, middle income has a marginal effect on the child's participation in education. Conclusions and Recommendations: It can be said that negative conditions have a negative effect on girls' education particularly. Improvements in these conditions play an important role in girls going to school.