How does parental involvement matter for children's academic achievement during school closure in primary school?

BACKGROUND: COVID-19 has infected over twenty million people across 200 countries. UNESCO claimed that more than 190 countries had implemented countrywide school closures, which resulted in preventing 1.6 billion students of their classroom learning opportunities. As children are unable to study in the classroom with teachers' supervision, the importance of parental engagement is amplified in children's learning at home. AIM: The primary purpose of the present study was to investigate how parental involvement contribute to children's academic achievement during school closure. SAMPLE: Two hundred and twenty-nine primary school children and their parents. METHOD: Children's academic achievement before (T1) and after school closure (T3), parental involvement (T2) and children's learning engagement (T2) during school closure were measured. RESULTS: After controlling for gender, age, grade and SES, children's learning engagement (T2) served as a full mediator of the association between parental involvement (T2) and children's academic achievement from T1 to T3. Moreover, parental psychological control (T2) moderated the association between parental involvement (T2) and children's learning engagement (T2). Specifically, the contribution of parental involvement to children's learning engagement became stronger for children whose parents had higher levels of psychological control. Higher Chinese parental psychological control did not always correlate to lower academic outcomes in the context of COVID-19. CONCLUSION: These findings highlight the central roles of parental involvement and children's learning engagement in children's academic achievement during school closure caused by COVID-19.

A Study of Lacquerware Industry’s Upgrading and Sustainability Strategies from the Perspective of GVCs—Using China Fuzhou Lacquerware Industry as Example

To discover how the lacquerware industry realizes its core competency, it is important to explore its upgrading strategies in the global value chains. The purpose of this study is to discuss the upgrading strategies applied during the lacquerware industry’s four economic stages and the approach to realize the industry’s sustainability. Results show that (1) OEM enterprises reach process upgrading with four strategies, ODM enterprises reach product upgrading with five strategies, OBM enterprises reach functional upgrading with four strategies, and OSM enterprises reach chain upgrading with two strategies;(2) the lacquerware industry‘s main elements in SSCM include the long-standing relations, reprocessing of defective products, employing the local community, and participation in regional and transregional development initiatives, wherein the design sector is the main link in the SSCM of the lacquerware. The result and implications provided by this study can serve as a reference for other lacquerware and local traditional handicraft industries that are seeking to upgrade and achieve sustainability during their economic development.