School Grades After a Parent Dies: What Research Around the World Shows

Wherever researchers have followed whole populations, children whose parent has died leave school with lower grades on average than their classmates, and are less likely to go on to further and higher education. The gap is real but modest, and much of it reflects the circumstances these families were already in before the death. Comparing brothers and sisters in Sweden shrank it to a small fraction^[1].

For a child whose mum or dad has died, school carries on: the timetable, the homework, the exams that come round on fixed dates whether a family is ready or not. Grief can make concentrating hard, and a household may have less money, less time and one fewer adult to help. This study sets out what research worldwide shows about children's schooling after a parent's death, and what it suggests schools and services can do. The strongest evidence comes from Nordic national registers, which link every child's school record to their parents' deaths.

Wherever whole populations have been followed, grades are lower on average

A 2022 systematic review found 22 studies on bereavement and educational outcomes in children and young people (17 quantitative and 5 qualitative) and concluded that, in general, bereavement "can constitute a barrier to educational achievement"^[3]. The largest and most precise studies come from Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Norway, where national registers can follow every child.

Among 908,064 children born in Sweden between 1991 and 2000, 22,634 (2.5%) had a parent die before age 17. At the end of compulsory school, 15.8% of them were not eligible for upper secondary education, against 9.1% of children whose parents were alive. Their mean grades were 0.30 standard deviations lower before any adjustment^[1]. An earlier Swedish study of 772,117 children born 1973–1981 found the same pattern: unadjusted, a father's death before age 15 went with 2.04 times the odds of leaving school with incomplete grades, and a mother's death with 1.51 times the odds^[4].

In Finland, among children born 1982–1990, a father's death was linked with a 12.7 percentage point lower probability of finishing secondary education, and a mother's death with 10.6 points lower, allowing only for sex and year of birth^[5]. Denmark's whole-population study of over a million people born 1982–2000 found lower attainment at every level, from basic school to a university graduate degree^[2].

Much of the gap reflects circumstances that were there before the death

Circumstances such as low income, less education or long-term illness shape children's schooling whether or not a parent dies. In the Swedish 1991–2000 cohort, bereaved children were more likely to have parents with only basic education and to have been born into the lowest income fifth^[1]. So the honest question is not only "are grades lower?" but "how much lower because of the death itself?"

Each step of adjustment answers part of that. In the Swedish study, allowing for parents' education, income, health and other factors measured before the child was born reduced the grade gap from 0.30 to 0.19 standard deviations. The risk of not qualifying for upper secondary school fell to 1.36 times that of other children^[1]. The researchers then compared children whose parent died before they finished compulsory school with their own older brothers and sisters, who were bereaved only after finishing it. This removes everything siblings share. The grade gap fell to 0.06 standard deviations, still statistically significant. The difference in qualifying for upper secondary school was no longer significant^[1].

The earlier Swedish study found the same: after adjusting for family socioeconomic position and parents' substance misuse, mental health problems and criminality, the odds of school failure fell from 2.04 to 1.40 times for a father's death and from 1.51 to 1.18 for a mother's, but remained raised^[4]. In Finland, half of the links between a parent's death and children's education were explained by childhood family characteristics^[5].

The UK evidence points the same way, but it is older and thinner. In the 1970 British Cohort Study, 4% of boys and 5% of girls had a parent die by age 16. At 16, 21% of bereaved boys had no qualifications, against 11% of boys in intact families; for girls the figures were 13% and 8%^[6]. By 30, 18% of bereaved women held no qualifications, against 13% of women from intact families. Once family background from birth was taken into account, the link with having no qualifications "largely disappeared", remaining only at the margins of significance for women^[6]. A 2004 UK study of GCSE results, as summarised by the Childhood Bereavement Network, found parentally bereaved pupils scored on average half a grade lower than their peers^[7]. In the Netherlands, the Generation R cohort found no difference in end-of-primary-school test scores at 12–13 between children bereaved by age 10 and others. Its definition took in the death of any loved one, not only a parent^[8].

None of this means grief does not matter at school. It means that a gap seen across a whole population is partly a gap in circumstances. That suggests support may need to take in the family's wider situation, not only the bereavement. Age may also matter. Within Swedish families, children who were younger when their parent died had lower grades^[1]. In the US, the strongest link with later degree attainment was for a family death at ages 10–13^[9].

The gap follows young people into further and higher education

Compulsory-school grades are only the first step. In Denmark, after adjusting for family income, parental education and parental psychiatric illness, people bereaved of a parent before 18 had lower rates of completing every level of education. For high school or vocational training the rate ratios were 0.78 for men and 0.82 for women; for a university graduate degree, 0.77 for both. The parent's gender, the cause of death and the child's age at the death did not change these associations^[2].

A Norwegian register study followed 373,104 people born 1970–1994. It looked at the 3,692 whose parent died before they were 18 from external causes such as accidents, violence or suicide. Of them, 56.3% completed high school, against 67.2% of others, and 24.9% completed university or college, against 33.4%^[10]. After adjusting for ethnicity, sex, year of birth and earlier education, but not for family income or parental education, their rate of completing high school was 0.68 times that of others^[10]. These are differences across a population, not a prediction for any one young person. Most of these young people did complete high school, and one in four completed university or college. We look at this group in our study of children bereaved by suicide.

In Finland, a father's death was linked with an 8.8 percentage point lower probability of enrolling at university, and a mother's death with 5.6 points lower, before adjustment for family background^[5]. In the United States, the Add Health study followed 14,796 adolescents from 1994–1995 to ages 24–32. Those who had experienced a family death, of a parent or a sibling, had 0.60 times the odds of gaining a bachelor's degree, after adjusting for household income, parental education and health. The predicted probability of a degree was 31% with no family death and 20% after a death at ages 10–13^[9]. The same study found that such deaths were far more common for some groups: 11.7% of white participants had a parent or sibling die by age 23, against 24.3% of Black and 30.3% of Native American participants^[9]. Where deaths in young and middle adulthood are unequal, so is this educational disadvantage.

Leaving education is only one route. A Norwegian study linked a parent's death in childhood with more years spent not in education, employment or training in young adulthood^[11]. We cover attendance, exclusion and early leaving in our study of school attendance after bereavement.

The studies use different measures, cohorts and adjustments, so their figures are not directly comparable.

A family's resources can cushion the effect

The Finnish research suggests the gap is not fixed. Among children born 1982–1987 whose father died, those whose surviving mother had high socioeconomic resources were no more likely than other children to drop out of upper secondary school^[12]. University was the exception: even in high-resource families, a father's death "noticeably reduced" the usual advantage^[12]. A second Finnish study found that having a highly educated surviving parent "might protect" against poorer educational outcomes^[5].

Read the other way, children whose surviving parent has fewer resources carry more of the disadvantage, and in Sweden parental death was already more common in families with lower incomes and less education^[1]. The surviving parent's own wellbeing is part of this too; we look at it in our study of the parent who is left.

In poorer countries, the question is whether children stay in school at all

Where schooling costs money and households are poorer, the evidence is less about grades and more about enrolment. In Kenya, a five-year panel of over 20,000 children found "a substantial decrease in school participation following a parent death", and a smaller drop before it, during the parent's illness. The effects were largest when a mother died^[13]. In KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, a mother's death was "a strong predictor of poor schooling outcomes"^[14].

Across 10 sub-Saharan African countries, lower enrolment among children whose parents had died was "not accounted for solely by their poverty". It was largely explained by their greater tendency to live with distant relatives or unrelated caregivers^[15]. Who cares for a child after a death matters as much as the death itself. Encouragingly, ten national surveys in South Africa between 1993 and 2005 found "no evidence of a systematic strengthening" of the educational disadvantage, even as the number of children whose parents had died rose^[16].

The 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami let researchers separate sudden deaths from what came before, because the same children had been surveyed beforehand. In Aceh, Indonesia, five years on, boys aged 15–17 at the time whose parents had both died had completed 1.7 fewer years of schooling. They were 40 percentage points less likely to be enrolled and 34 points more likely to be working than boys whose parents survived. Effects on younger children were "more muted"^[17]. Many of these older boys had taken on the role of head of the household.

What the evidence asks of us

• Treat schools as part of bereavement support. The Swedish researchers conclude that bereaved children "may benefit from additional educational support" to reduce the risk of poorer prospects later in life^[1]. The Danish authors argue that support for bereaved school children "may be more important than realized"^[2]. A 2019 review for Winston's Wish found that only small numbers of British schools have "a planned, managed and holistic response to bereavement". Provision was patchy, and only Denmark and Australia appeared to run school bereavement response systems on a national scale^[18]. We look at this in our study of school bereavement policies.
• Look beyond the first months. In England, Wales and Northern Ireland, exam boards' special consideration offers at most a small adjustment to marks. The Childhood Bereavement Network's 2021 summary of the rules in force before 2021 gives a maximum of 5% of raw marks, generally only for deaths within six months of the exam; Scotland's arrangements differ^[7]. The register studies follow effects over years, and in Sweden a younger age at the death went with lower grades years later^[1]. Schools need a way to keep a child's bereavement in view as they move through the system.
• Target support where resources are thinnest. In Finland, children whose surviving parent had more resources were largely protected from dropping out^[12]. Practical and financial help for families with fewer resources is part of educational support.
• Watch the move to further and higher education. In Denmark, Norway, Finland and the US, gaps persisted into high school completion and degrees^{[2][10][5][9]}. Colleges, universities and admissions systems are part of the picture.
• Count bereaved pupils, and study them. There is no recent UK study linking national pupil records to parental death; the main cohort evidence is from people born in 1970^[6]. The 2019 review called for "specific UK research with a national spread"^[18].

The research does not show that bereaved children are destined to do less well. It shows a gap that is partly about circumstances, partly about grief and partly about what happens next, and the last of these is the part that schools, services and policy can change.

Language: this piece uses plain words such as “died” rather than euphemisms, because they are clearer. Where it mentions suicide, it follows the Samaritans’ media guidelines.

Why we're publishing this

We brought this evidence together because bereaved children, their families, and the schools and organisations supporting them deserve the research in one place, cleanly sourced and ready to put in front of a head teacher, a commissioner or a minister. The case is theirs; our part is to say plainly what the data show. This study is part of our research library on children and young people bereaved of a parent.

How to read this data

Most figures here come from Nordic national registers, which cover whole birth cohorts and count rather than estimate. They adjust only for what registers record, so none fully separates the death from everything around it; the Swedish sibling comparison comes closest. The UK and US figures come from smaller cohort surveys, and the UK cohort was born in 1970. The US study counts the death of a sibling as well as a parent, and the Dutch study counts any loved one. The half-grade GCSE figure is from a 2004 UK study that we could see only as summarised by the Childhood Bereavement Network. The special consideration rules are that charity's 2021 summary of the pre-2021 rules; we could not check the exam boards' current guidance. The African and Indonesian studies measure enrolment and years of schooling in very different school systems. Measures differ (grade points, eligibility, odds ratios, rate ratios, hazard ratios), so figures from different studies should not be set side by side as if comparable. We found no study of attainment after a parent's death from Australia, Canada, New Zealand or Ireland, and no UK study using national pupil data.

Use this data

Free to cite with attribution to Understanding Bereavement. Charities, schools, services and journalists are welcome to reuse these figures and charts. For the underlying figures as a spreadsheet, get in touch.

Important: This study summarises published research about groups of people for general information. It is not medical advice or bereavement support, and it cannot describe or predict anything about an individual child or family. If you are worried about a child or about yourself, please speak to a GP or another qualified professional.

Sources

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