How do fathers affect their children’s education?

Join us online for the launch of the PIECE study final report.

Register your place on Eventbrite

'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 (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.

Join our two-hour webinar to hear about the project findings, the challenges fathers face in supporting their children’s learning and how policy shifts in practice might better support paternal involvement.

Dr Helen Norman will deliver the keynote; Dr Jeremy Davies (Co-investigator, Fatherhood Institute) will present a summary of survey result findings; a practice example will be provided by Jeszemma Howl (Fatherhood Institute); and the event will conclude with a panel discussion and Q&A session with representatives from Parentkind, Learning with Parents, Peeple, TheDadLab and Dope Black Dads.

Paternal Involvement & its Effects on Children's Education (PIECE)

PIECE is a Fatherhood Institute research project funded by the Economic and Social Research Council. The project conducted the first longitudinal empirical analysis in England, exploring the relationship between fathers’ childcare involvement and their children’s attainment at primary school. The PIECE project team is led by Dr Helen Norman (University of Leeds) with Dr Jeremy Davies (Fatherhood Institute) and Professors Mark Elliot and Colette Fagan from the University of Manchester.

Event Programme: 

If you have any questions about this event, please contact Grace Carter at Leeds University Business School.