ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to consider parent groupings and parent representation, joint action, corporate rights, the structures within which schools and parents interact, the ways in which those structures can be developed to promote partnership. The operation of choice, and to a lesser degree the encouragement of individual parents to become more effective clients, can actually damage the long term interests of parents as a whole in an adequately resourced and more responsive service. Many local education authorities take great pride in the high proportion of parents whose preferences they have been able to meet. Despite lack of official encouragement, parents' organisations at school and national level have been established and have survived a long time. The early Advisory Centre saw its task as to inform and advise parents, and its magazine carried many general articles around various aspects of the subject of what made a good school.
