I find the negative attention given to the single mother in this case in the media is atrocious. Yes, a relationship between a father and daughter is important in many ways. Unfortunately, not everyone is able to have a relationship with her father. As you state, 24 million children live in homes without a father. Thus, millions of children are excluded from these types of gender-specific events in schools. Why should we “celebrate” a man doing what he is SUPPOSED to be doing (remaining involved in his daughter’s life)? Furthermore, I have an issue with the idea that father-daughter dances somehow promote father-daughter relationships in a meaningful way. They do not encourage absentee fathers to “show up” for their daughters, nor do they strengthen tenuous bonds of strained father-daughter relationships. Fathers should be present in their children’s (NOT just daughters’) lives throughout the year, not just for one school-sanctioned event. Rather than having gender-specific events that exclude children who have no opposite-gender parent in their lives (this isn’t just limited to single-mother households with daughters, but single fathers with sons, and same-sex parents and other non-“traditional” families), there should be whole-family events (perhaps a family dance, or family baseball game). As a daughter of a single mother, I know what it is like to be excluded from father-daughter dances and activities. Sure, I could have gone with my mom or a male relative, but it would have been miserable as a child without a father to attend an event that further highlights the fact that I had no father by seeing all of my friends and classmates with their own dads. These girls (myself included) will miss out on many more “traditional” experiences in their lives (such as the father-daughter dances at their weddings). On another note, your comparisons of other school events are offensive. A student can practice or train to get better at sports (if s/he is interested in putting forth that effort). A student can study to improve his/her grades (again, if s/he is interested in putting forth that effort). There is no amount of effort that can be put forth by a child to change his or her gender or family composition. Comparing sports and academics to fatherlessness or motherlessness is a false analogy. This isn’t just an issue of gender discrimination in my estimation either. It could also be considered race discrimination. According to the National Kids Count Program, 34% of children overall are raised in single-parent households in the U.S. (as of 2010). However, the racial disparity is substantial. 24% of non-hispanic white and 16% of Asian or Pacific Islander children are raised in single-parent households, while 41% of Hispanic/Latino, 52% of American Indian, and 66% of Black/African American children are raised in single-parent households. Thus, a higher percentage of non-white and non-Asian/Pacific Islander children are excluded from gender-specific parent school events than white and Asian/Pacific Islander students are. Finally, I am not trying to argue that a father’s relationship with his daughter is unimportant or that it shouldn’t be fostered. What I am arguing is that school-sanctioned events should not exclude a large portion of the student body because of a combination of gender and family-makeup. Instead of the exclusionary father-daughter and mother-son activities traditionally sanctioned by schools, we should be implementing whole-family events and activities to accommodate the evolving definition of parenthood and family.