Beginning this November, it won’t be uncommon to see fathers, uncles and grandfathers wandering the halls and playground at Bigfork Elementary School. They will be among the first group of volunteers in the Watch DOGS program —Dads Of Great Students— a volunteer-based initiative designed to bring positive male role models into students’ lives. Watch DOGS participants volunteer for up to an entire school day and spend time with students in grades pre-K through fourth during lunchtime, recess and in the classroom. They also wear Watch DOGS T-shirts so students can easily identify the participants as volunteers.

“There’s multiple students who don’t have father figures in their life,” said elementary school principal Brenda Clarke. “It could just take that one person to make a difference for a child.”

More than 75 potential Watch DOGS attended a pizza kick-off night held Sept. 24 to learn more about the program and to sign up for volunteer shifts. For student safety, every participant will be required to pass a background check before they are allowed to volunteer.

Clarke said start-up costs for the program were minimal at $500. She was encouraged by the amount of initial interest from prospective volunteers. Most of the father figures that have signed up so far were parents of elementary students, while a few were members of the community without children in the system.

“Because we have so many volunteers, we plan to have dads in most of those classrooms,” Clarke said of the pre-K to fourth-graders. “We don’t want to take the focus away from instruction, we want them to be able to aid in instruction.”

Clarke hopes the project will encourage more father figures to take part in their children’s education. Clarke has noticed that generally, “moms feel more conformable than what father figures have felt, so I just wanted to make sure that we could personally invite them so they know that we really want them involved as well.”

Research shows that fathers or father figures who are actively involved can positively impact the development of a child, leading to better emotional, academic, social and behavioral outcomes, according to the Fatherhood Project, a nonprofit program that promotes father engagement.

Watch DOGS first launched in 1998 at an elementary school in Arkansas and has grown to achieve a presence in more than 6,450 schools nationwide.

“It’s new so I’m really excited to see how it’s going to work this year. We had really positive remarks and feedback from the dads … and the kids are really excited to have our dads in our school,” Clarke said. “We just want to pull people in so they see all the wonderful things we are doing.”

To learn more about the Watch DOGS program at Bigfork Elementary School, visit the school at 600 Commerce Street or call (406) 837-7412.