At the same time as the number of lone mother families has been increasing, education policy has demanded more involvement in children's schooling from ‘parents’ (i.e., mothers). Social policy in this area is inherently contradictory, encouraging lone mothers into paid employment on the one hand, whilst imploring mothers to ‘help’ in (and out of) the classroom on the other. Whilst lone mothers become scapegoats for all societal ills, parental involvement schemes are seen to solve society's ‘problems’. Drawing on data from a research project, this article begins to examine the contradictions within and between these policies for low income lone mothers.