Better call mom: Schools still see mothers as the default parent to contact

As the new school year begins, parents face a familiar set of duties: purchasing school supplies, managing paperwork, arranging transportation, and responding to numerous emails from teachers and administrators. While many families attempt to divide these tasks, studies have shown that mothers typically bear a larger burden. This includes not just attending school events and packing lunches, but also the less noticeable work of scheduling medical appointments, signing up for after-school activities, and answering emails or calls from educators.

A team of economists who examine gender and family dynamics have discovered that schools might inadvertently exacerbate this imbalance by routinely contacting mothers more often than fathers. The researchers conducted an extensive nationwide experiment involving over 80,000 K–12 school principals. They sent out emails to fictitious households with both a mother and father interested in enrolling a child.

The email included both parents' phone numbers and asked the principal to call one of them. By randomly altering the names and wording, they could determine if a parent's gender influenced the decision to make contact. When neither parent appeared more available, mothers were about 1.4 times more likely to receive the initial phone call.

Among principals who actually returned the call, about 60% chose to contact the mother first, while 40% called the father. The researchers also tested if providing more information about parental availability would change these patterns. When the email highlighted that the father was more available to speak, schools were significantly more likely to call him.

However, even when fathers were shown as the more available parent, many schools still chose to call the mother first. Another factor at play was the sender's identity. If the father sent the email and included the mother as a copy, schools were more likely to reach out to him. Yet again, mothers continued to receive a significant portion of the calls.

These findings indicate that many schools still view mothers as the default parent to contact regarding their children's education, even when presented with information suggesting fathers are equally—or even more—available. While the researchers emphasize that it's not necessarily intentional on the part of school staff, when similar decisions are made thousands of times across schools and other organizations, they can contribute to the unequal division of caregiving responsibilities that already exists within many families.

Schools are just one source of the numerous demands placed on mothers, such as scheduling doctor appointments, coordinating extracurricular activities, and managing other behind-the-scenes family tasks. These responsibilities are often referred to as the "mental load" of parenting because they involve planning, monitoring, and coordinating.

Surveys conducted alongside the experiment revealed that educators and other adults who regularly interact with families, including childcare providers, coaches, and medical professionals, also contact mothers more frequently than fathers. While one phone call may seem insignificant, over the course of a school year—and across various institutions like doctor's offices, sports teams, camps, and other activities—these interruptions can accumulate, adding to the demands placed on mothers' time.

This perspective also sheds light on why gender gaps in caregiving persist even among couples striving to share responsibilities more equally. The unequal distribution of parenting tasks is influenced not only by decisions within households, but also by expectations and routines outside the home. Many schools offer families the option to specify whom to contact first or designate different contacts for different situations.

By making these preferences clear at the start of the school year, schools may better align their communication with how each family chooses to share responsibilities.