Fatherhood: Featuring All Pro Dad
Family First Engages Fathers, Elevates their Role, Connects them with their Children
By Amy Morgan
More than 19 million children in America live without father figures. All Pro Dad (APD) is one of the programs offered by Florida-based Family First designed to give men practical fatherhood tools and encouragement to engage with their families and reduce the numbers of fatherless children.
Founded by Mark Merrill and Pro Football Hall of Fame Coach, Tony Dungy, APD has served families and fathers since 1997. One of the main goals of APD is to provide programs and initiatives that will counteract the negative societaleffects of fatherlessness, particularly poor academic and social outcomes. APD provides men with multiple tools — resources, training, and events — to engage with their kids and become better fathers who raise their children with a healthy and hopeful future.
APD encourages dads to join the movement in easy steps:
one minute a day to read an email
30 minutes a week to listen to a podcast
one hour a month to attend a meeting with their child at a local chapter
one day a year at an All Pro Dad Experience.
Since 2004, the All Pro Dad Experience has been held over 140 times in more than 30 different NFL, MLB, and NCAA markets.
Jason Hood has served as the National Director for the APD Chapter Program at Family First for the past five years, where he maintains chapter development, trains facilitators, and connects with dads across the country who are committed to being present and intentional in their children's lives. Jason oversees a team of 15 who support more than 1600 APD Chapters in 40 different states.
He cites four decades of research that show when dads are involved in schools, children’s grades are better, their ability to learn and be creative increases, attendance improves and behavior issues decline.
“Our goal is to change the culture to help schools understand dads aren’t just nice to have – they are needed,” Jason said.
Their slogan: Presence over Perfection.
APD’s recommended formula of 1:1:1 breaks down to: spend one minute a day reading an encouraging Play of the Day email (one of the most widely read fatherhood emails in the country), 30 minutes a week to listen to a podcast, one hour a month to have breakfast with your child (which can be done at school through an All Pro Dad Chapter) and one day a year to attend an All Pro Dad experience in an NFL or NCAA stadium to interact with your kids in a fun environment.
Family First creates the content for the APD emails, blog posts, podcasts and curriculum, as well tracks engagement through number of subscriptions, numbers of chapters, and attendance at meetings and annual events.
Texas:
Texas boasts the second largest APD presence among participating states, with a robust footprint of 338 school-based chapters. These are mainly centered around the DFW metroplex, Houston ex-burbs and San Antonio’s west side. District partners include Fort Worth ISD, Crowley ISD (FW), Desoto ISD (Dallas), Irving ISD (DFW), Northside ISD (SA), Alief ISD (Houston), and Lubbock ISD.
The Center for Public Education and Community Engagement at TCU’s College of Education published a report in July 2024 studying APD’s impact in Texas.
From the Executive Summary: “The All Pro Dad (APD) Program has garnered overwhelmingly positive perceptions from participants. The program's unique focus on engaging fathers and providing them with tools to develop social-emotional skills is highly valued. Participants appreciate the dedicated efforts to include fathers in meaningful ways, as this specific engagement with fathers is often overlooked in other school-based programs. The ‘moment of pride’ shared at the beginning of meetings is particularly meaningful, creating a sense of accomplishment and bonding that resonates deeply with the participants.”
The survey further reports that of dads who participated “95% of respondents reported feeling more connected to their child’s school, 92% reported growing closer to their child, 96% reported learning new parenting skills, 72% reported reading with their child at least once a week, 98% reported telling their child that they are proud of them at least once a month, and 98% reported having meaningful conversation with their child more often.”
Comments included:
“The program helps facilitate conversations with kids about important topics (Respect, Resilience, Communication, Compassion, Wisdom, Peace, Confidence, Forgiveness, and Love).”
“I'm sure many more conversations have happened, (stet) and will happen because of the time that was spent.”
In Texas, individual schools and school districts can choose to partner with APD and to engage dads using their three-prong strategy of daily emails, monthly chapter meetings, and annual stadium experience offered in both Houston and DFW.
Other states structure their fatherhood efforts differently. Several have engaged Family First to lead broad, state-wide marketing campaigns to elevate the issue and importance of fatherhood. The media campaign then drives fathers toward supportive and collaborative efforts offered by organizations in their communities.
Florida
In Florida, APD reaches over 74,000 Play of the Day subscribers, boasts more than 500 school-based Chapters and has hosted 50+ All Pro Dad Experiences over the last 15 years.
Despite these impressive numbers, Florida launched a three-year campaign in 2023 to raise public awareness and support of fatherhood as a result of support from the Florida legislature and the Office of The Governor. Family First was enlisted to spearhead the effort due in part to its quality content and expertise with programs like APD. Family First began by creating a new brand for Florida’s campaign – Father First – under the helm of Susan Merrill, Chief Marketing and Program Officer, and Lesley Bateman.
“I love engaging with my child through APD and love the interaction and connection with his school.”
“Two new dads came and brought their 4th grader daughters. The looks on their faces when their daughters were talking made everything worth it today. You could see how meaningful it was for them.”
“I was impressed with how much our 3rd, 4th and 5th Grade students enjoyed participating in the activities we had planned for this meeting. Students and parents left the meeting with a great understanding of what Purpose is and how parents can help their kids finding their purpose in life and how they can work hard to achieve their dreams.”
Anecdotally Family First hears comments from schools with strong APD chapters like, “Our grades increase” and “The day the dads are here the kids are different people.”
These positive results in Florida led to Ohio also partnering with Family First to implement a marketing campaign to encourage father engagement for their residents.
Ohio
Ohio’s media campaign launched in March 2026. Unlike Florida, Ohio already has a formal Fatherhood Commission housed within its Department of Children and Youth, complete with website, so Family First was able to move directly to the co-branded advertisements that drive viewers to a landing page to capture information for direct email marketing.
Family First will also work with the Ohio’s Fatherhood Commission to reach existing fatherhood organizations (which are receiving financial support from TANF) . Together will make sure local organizations are aligned and able to offer the All Pro Dad Experience to their constituents. The goal again is to get dads even more engaged by subscribing to the Play of the Day, joining a Chapter or attending the Experience.
Family First will provide both the media campaign and the multiple format content in 4D – visual, written, audio, and social media info bites.
What does success look like?
Family First evaluatesoutcomes at the end of a contract to ask:
Have we engaged more fathers?
Are more dads subscribing and staying subscribed to Play of the Day?
Have more Chapters been started in the state?
Have we elevated the role of fathers?
More details about APD
There are countless fathers who genuinely want to be great dads but don't know where to start. The All Pro Dad team equips fathers with resources, encouragement, and proven strategies—whether through school-based breakfast programs, online content, or community events—to help them become the best versions of themselves, one day at a time.
1:1:1 framework
Play of the Day:
Fathers are encouraged to sign up to receive a one-minute practical email delivered five days a week with tips about how to be a better dad. Themes highlight messages:
It’s for every dad, everywhere
It doesn’t matter what your past is
Your child’s future is dependent on your engagement with them
Chapter experience:
Once a month dads and kids come together to have breakfast before school, at the school. Meetings are run by volunteer Team Captain dads, who are supported with resources from Family First, which follows up with the Team Captains monthly.
Once a chapter registers their school, Team Captains have access to a dashboard where they can schedule meetings, record attendance, download curriculum (PowerPoint presentations, program videos, discussion cards, handouts, leader’s guides, certificates and fillable flyers.) The cost to create a chapter is $100/school. Requiring a small registration fee encourages buy-in without a high cost barrier.
The Chapters are dad-driven, Jason said, because dads need to build their own community, connect with other dads and feel welcome at school. While the marketing efforts are designed for fathers, any father-figure is welcome, including moms who might want to attend. Team Captains liaise with the school principal and/or family engagement specialist, and often the PTA/PTO, to coordinate the schedule and arrange for the meal.
All chapter meetings open with the Pride Moment. Dads turn to their children and tell them something about them of which they are proud. This warm beginning opens hearts and sets the stage for meaningful conversation, Jason said. The curriculum is character-based and focuses on facilitating communication and connection between fathers and their children.
The group watches a five-minute video related to the character trait of the meeting: integrity, thankfulness, kindness … after which the father and child spend time together on the provided discussion questions. Meetings usually include a fun game or activity.
Jason cites a recent example from Alief ISD (outside Houston). The principal was skeptical they’d have enough dads to participate. Instead, 200 dads showed up to the meeting, he reported. Fort Worth ISD now numbers 70 participating schools across the district. The district has partnered with Sodexo food purveyor to provide breakfasts.
All-Pro Dad Event:
The three-hour events are held at NFL or NCAA stadiums (ATT Stadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys, is a location in Texas), during which dads and kids rotate through stations on the field and participate in interactive games designed to strengthen their relationship. Activities may include a football throw, a tickle/tackle station, diving into inflatable pillows, a dream wall to plan a fun future event for the father/child, and a reading station, among others. A guest speaker (usually a well-known athlete like past-participant Jason Witten) gives a motivational, kid-appropriate message to kick off the event. Attendance is approximately 400 families.
In addition to promoting the event to Chapter members, Family First supports the event with a marketing campaign a month prior that includes digital ads on Meta platforms and promotion through community calendars. They often enlist an APD-affiliated sports personality to conduct pre-event media interviews to increase visibility.
Dads can be and want to be involved in their kids’ lives. But they need to realize their importance and be given an opportunity. Research from TCU and The University of South Florida shows All Pro Dad can move the needle. Family First’s APD program has been proven effective and worthy of future support and expansion.
