BC Council for Families

by Ruby Banga
Program Coordinator

"Fathers are launching a quiet revolution... born of a new, growing spirit of determination among young men to fully embrace their roles as fathers."

A trio of researchers from Boston College's Center for Work and Family wrote those words, in the Huffington Post, over a year ago.  Now, they have the data to back up that statement.

Their study, The New Dad: Caring, Committed and Conflicted, looked at the family situations of 1,000 white collar working fathers in the US, and found that dads are struggling to balance work and family.  More than two-thirds of fathers  reported that they see their primary role as an equal balance between "caring for my child and earning money to meet his/her financial needs." 

Dads, they say, "want to have more time to be with their children and they aspire to do more at home. At the same time, they have equally strong desires to be successful at work and to advance in their careers. Thus, we are left with an image of today's fathers as caring, committed and conflicted, struggling to be engaged parents while striving for advancement in their careers."

One question this raises for service providers is, how best to support dads who are struggling to find ways to connect with their children.  Brian Russell of the Ontario Father Involvement Initiative has been finding creative answers to this question for years -- most recently with the innovative website for new dads, 24hour Cribside Assistance.

Recently, I had a chance to chat with Brian about what dads today need and want, and what service providers can do to help facilitate involved fathers.  You can listen in to our conversation -- it's the latest podcast interview in our monthly Voices of Family series.