'How do fathers affect their children's education?' has been rescheduled for 20 September 2023 from 11:30 - 13:30.

Teachers estimate that almost half of children are not ‘school ready’ when they start their primary education (Kindred, 2022), putting them at risk of a lifetime of under-achievement compared to their peers (e.g. see Cassen and Kingdon 2007). What parents do at home to support their children’s learning has a huge impact on their educational attainment, but fathers’ specific contributions to this have been unclear – until now.

Paternal Involvement & its Effects on Children's Education (PIECE), a major Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded study led by Dr Helen Norman (Leeds University Business School), has analysed cutting-edge data from the Millennium Cohort Survey, linked to the official educational records of children at ages five and seven, finding that fathers’ childcare involvement has a unique and important effect on the educational outcomes of children.

Our findings are essential reading for policymakers and education leads at national and local level; primary school head teachers and school staff, including parental engagement leads; early years leaders, setting managers and practitioners; as well as for fathers and mothers.

Join us for a two-hour webinar to hear about our findings; explore the challenges fathers face in supporting their children’s learning; and consider how changes in policy and shifts in practice by early years settings and schools might better support paternal involvement.

This is an online event hosted by Leeds University Business School. All participants will receive the PIECE final report and our summary briefing for educators and families.

Programme

11:30 - Welcome and introductions: Andrew Gwynne MP, Shadow Public Health Minister and Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Fatherhood

11:40 - Keynote: Dr Helen Norman (Leeds University Business School) summarises the main findings of the study

12:05 - Dr Jeremy Davies (Co-investigator, Fatherhood Institute) summarises the results of our survey of fathers’ experiences of school-home support

12:15 - Q&A session

12:25 - Break

12:35 - Practice example: Jeszemma Howl (Fatherhood Institute) talks about FRED (Fathers Reading Every Day)

12:45 - Panel discussion

Contributions provided by:

Sian Lewis, Head of Parent Participation, Parentkind

Tom Harbour, Chief Executive Officer, Learning with Parents

Liz Ersoy, Training and Accreditation Manager, Peeple

Sergei Urban, Founder, TheDadLab

Umar Kankiya, Media Lead, Dope Black Dads

Questions from the audience welcome after the chaired panel session.

13:25 - Thanks and event close

'How do fathers affect their children's education?' has been rescheduled for 20 September 2023 from 11:30 - 13:30.

P﻿rogramme

S﻿peaker Biographies

Programme

Speaker Biographies

How do fathers affect their children’s education?