ACCESS TO INTEREST-RELATED EDUCATION IN LATVIA FOR CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE: PARENTS' PERSPECTIVE

According to the Education Law of Latvia, every child in Latvia has the right to access education including interest-related education. There are several interest-related education programmes available for children and young people up to age 25. The research seeks to discover the parent's perspective on child and youth access to interest education. This paper uses data from an on-line questionnaire developed and disseminated to parents through social media. A sample of 124 parents with experience in interest education was used. The small-scale research findings suggest the four most popular reasons why children are not attending the interest-related education programmes are: lack of information, no interest-related classes provided or conducted, children are too busy so overload can occur, and there is no support stuff provided during the classes. Although the majority of parents have had a positive experience concerning their children's accessibility to interest-related education, some parents have been refused access to an interest education due to children/youth's behaviour, a teacher's refusal to work with the child, social inclusion problems in the classroom, and a teacher's negative attitude. Research reveals that refusal to access is experienced more often by parents whose children have a disability. Several other issues which emerged from the research are also discussed - what are the barriers to accessibility to interest-related education and how to overcome them.