The More Involved Dads, the Better

With Father’s Day coming up on Sunday, it seems like a good time to talk about the value of getting as many dads as possible involved in your parent group. If you're really looking to transform involvement at your school, start thinking now about ways you can engage fathers. Dads are most likely your largest subset of less-involved parents, and they bring great energy and different talents and perspectives.

“A Place for Dads” is a great story that profiles three organizations that work in different ways to make it easier for dads to get involved in schools. And we’re always finding more great examples, like this one from Amy Beverland Elementary in Indianapolis: Their PTO’s dads club is an active extension of the main group that hosts an in-house basketball league for 1st and 2nd graders, sponsors an orchestra, and much more. We love to hear about groups of dads that really dig in like that.

Those are just some of the many ways fathers can get involved in their kids’ schools. Just remember: Dads are different. If you want success with fathers, you need to recruit and plan differently than you do with moms. We have tons more ideas on dad involvement.