Fathers' Involvement in Education, Learning, and Development for Children with CHARGE Syndrome

Abstract

Parent involvement in their children’s education is an essential element for their success, especially for families with CHARGE syndrome (Olivos, Gallagher, & Aguilar, 2010). Research on parent school involvement has conventionally focused directly on mothers, thus little is known about the experiences of fathers in school settings, specifically for fathers of children with disabilities (Pancsofar, Petroff, Rao, & Mangel, 2019). We analyzed transcriptions of interview data from 24 fathers of children with CHARGE syndrome. After coding the interview transcripts, we were able to find out fathers’ experience with the IEP. We found a divide between fathers’ positive and negative experiences at these meetings. In addition, we are in the process of finding the meaning within these negative and positive fathers’ experiences.