Cross-national comparison of parental choice of two-way bilingual education in the United States and Israel

This article presents a comparative analysis of a metasynthesis of Israeli and US studies on parental choice of two-way bilingual education. My analysis reveals that the reasons majority-language and minority-language parents expressed in the US and Israeli studies converge in some aspects but, significantly, also diverge. I argue that the divergences prob-lematize the sociopsychological motivational model that dominates the analysis of parental choice of bilingual schools and lack of engagement with the general sociological literature on parental choice and lack of international comparison of school choice. I address these gaps, drawing on two sociological insights to understand parental choice of bilingual education: sociohistorical and political dynamics of the educational fields in which the choices are made and a Bourdieusian culturalist understanding of parental choice. These two perspectives can account for the potential for divergence across locales and cultures and have implications for policy makers in parental choice and bilingual education.