School's Self-Presentation and its Perception by Parents

The research paper is devoted to parents' school choice and school self-presentation. I consider signals that are sent by the school administration at the Open Day and its parents’ perception. Two types of data are used in this work: the observational diaries from the Open Day in schools of Admiralteisky, Vasileostrovsky and Nevsky districts of Saint-Petersburg and the data, obtained during the parental survey at schools of Nevsky and Vasileostrovsky districts. The main hypothesis of my research is that there is a relationship between the parents’ socio-economic status/education and the way, how they perceive the signals of schools of different status. I suppose that parents with higher socio-economic status and higher education will consider signals of schools with advanced curriculum as "correct" and more likely will send their child there. Conversely, parents with lower socio-economic status without higher education will consider signals of comprehensive schools as "correct" and more likely will send their child there.