ISER has been commissioned to a lead a new year-long research project, funded by the Nuffield Foundation, to assess the impact of school closures on parents.
The study, Covid-19 and school availability: impact on parental labour supply and wellbeing, will be led by Dr Birgitta Rabe, with Dr Laura Fumagalli from ISER, Dr Jo Blanden from the University of Surrey and Dr Claire Crawford from the University of Birmingham and the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
School closures have been an important
feature of the response to the Covid-19
pandemic. These have a high direct cost to
children, disrupting learning and impacting
mental health. They are also costly for
parents, as time must be spent on childcare
that would previously have been spent on
work or other activities.
This project focuses
on parents and examines the impact of
school availability and attendance on parental
labour supply, family finances and mental
health.
Government guidance on school reopening
created differential access to childcare for
parents with children in different year groups.
Schools initially reopened for primary years
R, 1 and 6 in June 2020. This means that,
during the summer term, some parents no
longer had to provide childcare during school
hours, while others with very similar age
children still had to do so.
Comparing
changes in the outcomes of parents with
children in year groups expected to return
with those of children in other year groups will
allow us to isolate the impact of access to
school on parental outcomes. We will also
explore the responses of schools and parents
to this guidance, providing insights into which
schools and parents were most likely to
comply, and what effect children actually
returning to school had on parents’ outcomes.
Timely research on these issues will provide
important insights into the likely
consequences of any future school closures
or reductions in capacity, including the
possibility of longer-term effects on
employment and family wellbeing for parents,
especially mothers.