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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Why do schools alienate Dads?

116 replies

Dadsrule1234 · 29/01/2021 07:55

It has come to light during lockdown that my kids a school run a parent 1 and parent 2 system. I have asked them previously to email us both, but everything still comes to me only addressed to me. I am getting a complex because despite our 50/50 partnership as parents and both working full time I get every negative email about uniform and now home school. Is this normal? Why alienate the Dads they place a huge role. I don’t know how to approach this? The email about home schooling was really awful. I find it so strange that schools don’t value their parents anymore. Unless it’s just this one.. thoughts please.

OP posts:
Macncheeseballs · 29/01/2021 08:28

Laisson, 'stepford wife' is a bit extreme

grey12 · 29/01/2021 08:29

DD's school emails and texts both parents and further communication (by the teacher) is done with those apps

Hankunamatata · 29/01/2021 08:32

I just auto forward to dh

DappledThings · 29/01/2021 08:38

It annoys us that they have to have a primary contact and can't just email both of us. Would just be easier than having to forward on emails etc. I don't mind being the primary contact, I work PT and DH works FT but when we started in September I had assumed things like newsletters would go to all contacts.

Wishitsnows · 29/01/2021 08:42

You seem to be reaching a bit to try and find offence in something that's just not there.

Mummyoflittledragon · 29/01/2021 08:45

You deal with it by forwarding the email to your partner. Stop expecting a school, which has a ton of bureaucracy to bend to your individual wants. I expect schools are mindful more couples than not don’t want emails to both. Different if you were separated.

Idk what you mean about the homeschooling mail.

LaPampa · 29/01/2021 08:46

I was also annoyed by this because both of us working full time and trying to sort out both kids the burden on me to remember everything and pass it all on when it wasn’t always me running t the lessons was stressful. I said to the school if we were separated you must be able to email us both. In the end we changed it so I am lead parent for one child, him for the other & we both get the emails that go out generically.

Noconceptofnormal · 29/01/2021 08:48

I don't really understand why if the school has a malling list why they can't just add both parents. I'd find it annoying as well.

I wouldn't want to have to forward on everything as I feel like I'd need to filter the important from the unimportant and that is part of the mental load.

The above suggestion of the 'kid' email address which then gets autoforwarded to both would be the best suggestion.

reluctantbrit · 29/01/2021 08:49

Depends on their system. In primary school they sent out everythingn to both email addresses but asked for the priorty phone number in case of emergencies.

In Secondary they had the Parent 1 system the OP describes and we put DH on it and while got the calls (he was working from home compared to my 1 hour commute) he also got all letters which was a disaster as I deal with the paperwork. We asked the school to change it and they did this immediately. Yes, emails can be forwarded but DH's inbox means they could be overlooked and I ignore normally emails from him until I have time so an automatic forward is not helping. If I see the school as the sender I look at it immediately.

borageforager · 29/01/2021 08:49

I just don’t get why schools can’t import all the contact details & email both parents. Our secondary school emails us both, the primary school just emails me. Yes, it’s easy to forward emails but we get so many emails now (all the work is emailed out) it would be easier if it came direct to both of us. Yesterday I was at work & hadn’t noticed an update email correcting a broken link, meanwhile DH & DD were at home trying to do the work with the broken link. Of course eventually they rang me & I looked & found the missing email. So yeah it’s not hard to forward an email but it’s presumably equally not hard for a school to email both parents?

AuntieStella · 29/01/2021 08:52

Modern emailing systems mean there really is no extra cost or effort in emailing all those in the family who wish to be emailed

Separated, blended and reblended household, with any and every permutation of where a DC wakes up (and when another parent is uncontactable on shift so not doing emails) are so common that schools are really done no their community a disservice by insisting on one only.

Very poor show, but mercifully rare these days.

MillieEpple · 29/01/2021 08:59

There are a few different email systems that schools buy in. The better systems that are easier to use cost more money.
The problem if you import second contacts on some of the systems its not always people with parental responsibility. Lots of families have granny or their friend or their brother as contact 2 as its the person who can pick the child up easily if they are ill. They dont really need emails about uniform. The better systems let you email all contacts with parental responsibility.

ellenleaves · 29/01/2021 09:00

We have a joint email for school/utilities etc so everything like that goes there.

Clymene · 29/01/2021 09:16

It's weird that people are incapable of setting a rule on their email to forward all emails from a particular sender but expect schools to input twice the amount of email addresses into their system for convenience

DappledThings · 29/01/2021 09:23

@Clymene

It's weird that people are incapable of setting a rule on their email to forward all emails from a particular sender but expect schools to input twice the amount of email addresses into their system for convenience
But they have both email addresses. They asked for two on their forms but then choose to only use one of them. So they are happy to "input twice the amount of email addresses" but then decide which ones to exclude when emailing. Which seems a tad bizarre to me.
TulipsTwoLips · 29/01/2021 09:29

Raise it as an issue with the school and write an email for them to pass to the software providers. Then it doesn't make vast extra work for the school but may well help other families in the future.

It's only this way that things will change.

kursaalflyer · 29/01/2021 09:31

Fucking hell. Do some people wake up in the morning and think what have school done that I can moan about today?

JamesMiddletonsMarshmallows · 29/01/2021 09:35

They don't alienate dads they are just being plain sexist. Alienating dads would be refusing to send information when they've been asked. But I highly doubt many men insist on being the primary contact.

Not all schools are like this. Where I work we have a notes function in iSams that we always read before contacting anyone, where we can put "dad first contact". We also send emails out to all parents and step parents. My kids' school go one better and have a schedule on there for when exH has them and when I do so they aren't always contacting me, which is great.

JamesMiddletonsMarshmallows · 29/01/2021 09:37

Oh and we do send general emails to parent 1 and parent 2 don't all schools do this??

RedskyBynight · 29/01/2021 09:37

But they have both email addresses. They asked for two on their forms but then choose to only use one of them. So they are happy to "input twice the amount of email addresses" but then decide which ones to exclude when emailing. Which seems a tad bizarre to me.

It might well be a case that the school's email system can't cope with emailing 2 people per child. Which is a limitation of the email system, not the school.

SoupDragon · 29/01/2021 09:39

Why alienate the Dads they place a huge role.

Presumably it is you who alienated the dad by putting him as parent 2. You are the ones who got to pick the primary parent.

Anyway' for every person that whinges about this there will be another who would whinge about both parents getting emails unnecessarily

CMOTDibbler · 29/01/2021 09:40

DH is down as parent 1. He forwards me any emails I need to see. Anything specific to ds (like detentions) they send to both of us.

DappledThings · 29/01/2021 09:41

@JamesMiddletonsMarshmallows

Oh and we do send general emails to parent 1 and parent 2 don't all schools do this??
Ours doesn't! It's annoying. Not enough to go complaining to but annoying nonetheless.

It might well be a case that the school's email system can't cope with emailing 2 people per child. Which is a limitation of the email system, not the school.
I would call that a system that is not fit for purpose rather than just limited.

DynamoKev · 29/01/2021 09:42

Dad here. Separated and not primary carer but see DD as much as I can.
I had this with DD's primary school.
On the worst occasion I was due to collect DD from a school trip one afternoon. Arrived at school to find the place deserted, which was a worry. Tried to contact ex but no answer (she was at work so not entirely unreasonable). I went to the school office to be told that they had sent a text to parents to warn them the bus would be back an hour late.

The office person asked if I was contact number one - I said I didn't know (how would I know - no-one had ever told me there was a hierarchy before).

Thankfully secondary school is better although as a Dad I still miss out on some stuff.

Unfortunately my ex wishes to paint me as a Dad who doesn't care so she sometimes prefers to "forget" to tell me about stuff, but thankfully one of DDs friend's Mums tips me a wink about anything I may have missed.

luxxlisbon · 29/01/2021 09:44

@JamesMiddletonsMarshmallows "They don't alienate dads they are just being plain sexist. "

It isn't sexist of the school to contact the person they have been given as the first contact. It would be sexist if they refused to make the man the primary contact, which doesn't sound like it is the case at all.