Looking for Relationship term for "Never Been Married" parents of students

Patricia Glasser

Hi everyone,

I am looking for a relationship title to use between parents of students at our school who have never been married and are not a couple. We have things like “Ex-spouse”, "Partner" and of course “Spouse”, but these don't quite apply. To clarify, these are people who are not in a relationship with each other, have never been married, and live separately.

They are each connected to their child/the student as a “Parent”, but I would also like to have a Relationship connection between them for clarity when looking at records.

I feel as though there is an obvious term out there that I'm just not thinking of! Thanks for any suggestions.

Kim Ellis

@Patricia Glasser I haven't come across this yet myself but for some reason my first thought was “Co-Parent.” Not sure if that overlaps too much with Parent/Child relationship though.

Patricia Glasser

@Kim Ellis I got that suggestion from someone else as well! I think that will work nicely. Thanks

Alan French

@Patricia Glasser what about Ex-Partner? If you already have Spouse and Ex-Spouse, to me it would make sense to also have Partner and Ex-Partner as a “matching set”.

Tara Cain

@Patricia Glasser We use the term “former” rather than “ex”. But having tried to track this several different ways, including using “former spouse” as a relationship term, I've determined that the cleanest way to list “former” relationships is simply to put an end date on the current relationship--and make sure to remove the “spouse” connection (a separate step) if they were receiving communications as a couple. Even if you do not know the exact date of separation or divorce, you can use the date you were informed of the change. This results in fewer search terms, and allows you to easily see which relationships are still current.