Since 2006, Mestemacher awards a prize for two top fathers. For each prize winner the prize value is EUR 5,000.

The campaign aspires to expand the influence of a father on a child’s development and to promote the compatibility of family and career in partnership models of marriage and family. In contrary to the widespread opinion that the mother is the most important psychological parent in the first years of a child’s life, science has long proven that the father plays a role which is just as important for the development of a toddler, small child and pupil. The project breaks from the traditional belief that the mother alone is responsible for the first months and years of childhood. Rather, the necessity of an intense relationship between fathers and their children from the very beginning is emphasised.

Prof. Dr. Ulrike Detmers, initiator of the prize