This report summarizes the main results of a study conducted by researchers at the Harvard Graduate School of Education about what American high school students currently know and believe about parenting and child development.

Income-based achievement gaps in cognitive skills such as math and reading are fully substantiated at the time children enter Kindergarten (Reardon, 2013; von Hippel & Hamrock, 2016). Further, children who start behind, tend to stay behind (Stanovich, 1986). Therefore, if we want to prevent these achievement gaps, we need to focus on the early childhood period when the gaps grow the most. Further, parents who know more about parenting and child development and who have a stronger belief that they can make a difference in their child’s development, are more apt to interact with their children in ways that promote learning than parents with less parenting knowledge (Rowe, 2008). While numerous programs target parenting knowledge and practices in low-income families, and this approach has been successful for the small proportion of families who participate, they are costly (St. Pierre et al., 1995). Another approach, one that is both more preventative in nature and potentially more far-reaching, is to provide parenting knowledge to individuals before they become parents while they are still in school. To date, very little scholarly work has been done to show the efficacy of programs to prepare students for parenting and a role in young children’s lives.

Our first step in achieving this goal was to ascertain adolescents’ knowledge and understanding of parenting and child development by creating and validating the APKAS (Adolescent Parenting Knowledge and Attitudes Survey) questionnaire and administering it to over 1,000 U.S. high school students. No previous study has attempted to understand what high school students already know and believe about these topics. The questionnaire includes information about child development, the role of parents in children’s learning, and knowledge of basic parenting practices that are associated with healthy childhood outcomes. Through the results of the questionnaire, we have learned that while many high school students hold beliefs consistent with helpful practices with young children and their learning, there is much room for improvement. For example, fewer than 50% of respondents in the sample “Agree Strongly” with statements that indicate they hold beliefs associated with positive outcomes for young children. In addition, it seems that high school students have limited knowledge of developmental milestones. They are unsure of what infants and toddlers are capable of at different ages and seem not to ascribe much agency to young children. Moreover, high school students with less childcare experience, who are not from middle class backgrounds, or who are male are less likely to hold attitudes that would set up their children for future success. Furthermore, high school students report that, by far, they have learned the most about parenting from watching their own parents, and from television and movies next. This is especially troubling, since it is likely that media depictions of the realities of parenthood and of best strategies for promoting healthy development and academic success are lacking.

This research suggests there is an opportunity for high schools to serve as a site to improve adolescents’ knowledge and attitudes related to child rearing and development. It is our hope that this effort will eventually lead to an entire generation of adults prepared to embark as a positive force in young children’s lives.

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