BE HARD ON YOURSELF, NOT YOUR KIDS

“A steady rise in truancy and absenteeism” in our schools (Prosecutions to boost parenting?, August 20) can quite plausibly be sheeted home to the steady rise in solo parenting.

 

One in four Kiwi children are now growing up with only one parent: 23%, as opposed to an average of 14% in 27 countries surveyed by the OECD. And that parent is almost always the mother.

 

With no Dad at home and Mum out working, lots of those kids skip school. Studies show more truancy after divorce and separation, and more emotional problems. All children in schools with a high percentage of single parent families tend to perform less well, with teaching time and learning conditions adversely affected.

 

And now there’s another class of single mothers: professional women who want to have children with sperm donors because their careers took precedence over child-bearing.

 

The Jumbo in the room, strenuously avoided by the media, is the family factor. Children with two committed parents do better by almost any measure than those with only one.

 

We know it’s really hard at times to stick with the person with whom you made a family. But it’s better to be hard on yourself than on your children.