The mission of Parents Forum is to foster honest, respectful and caring communications in families. The Parents Forum program name, logo and curriculum materials are trademarked. Our workshop, a volunteer-led facilitated discussion, is suitable for parents of children and young people of all ages and for professionals who work with parents and children in any capacity.

The program's tagline “Come Share Your Strength” captures the program's positive intent. The powerful impact that our program has on participants, including incarcerated fathers, is evident from comments such as these . . .
The workshop gave me information I can use immediately, at home and everywhere!
This is what’s missing in a lot of other parents’ programs.
It offered new insights on things I ‘thought’ I knew.
This program can be a solution. This program gives hope!

The simplicity and effectiveness of Parents Forum make it a prime candidate to be taken to scale --as primary prevention and as an adjunct to treatment-- in a variety of settings including schools, clinics, workplaces and correctional facilities.

Problem

Strong social skills, based in empathy, underlie both individual and group achievement. Empathy towards others is based on one’s own emotional awareness. History shows that lack of empathy translates into violence. The annual cost of interpersonal violence in the U.S. is estimated at $300 billion (2004 World Health Report). The annual financial toll of young peoples’ depression, anxiety disorders, alcohol and other drug abuse and behavioral problems in the U.S. is $247 billion (National Research Council and Institute of Medicine report 2009). School-based initiatives to teach children and young people empathy go only so far. The key role we propose for Parents Forum is to offer schools, businesses and community agencies a powerful way to support parents in developing emotional awareness in themselves and their children.

Solution

Parents Forum builds upon long-established peer support traditions that address serious individual and family problems, including the recovery movement (AA and its offshoots) and programs for parents of children with special needs. Our program ‘flips’ peer support from remedial to preventive, showing individuals how to help each other better understand everyday interactions with family members, friends and associates. Participants in Parents Forum workshops increase their emotional awareness, as, guided by a volunteer facilitator, they express anger, resentment, grief, regret - as well as appreciation, joy and humor - using a simple conversational formula. The program works on a deep level and across differences of age, gender, ethnicity, nationality, class and family situation. Schools, businesses and community agencies licensing the Parents Forum curriculum engage parents, teachers, staff and young people in workshops and other activities that strengthen individual resilience and foster community cohesion.

Example

Fundamentally improving children and young people's experience requires universal parenting education. Parents Forum works to inculcate in parents the heart-based ability to understand oneself and to speak with and understand others. We provide accessible and powerful communications and conflict-management skills workshops for parents, caregivers and teachers, young people and other community members. Our curriculum of eight questions opens the door to pivotal discussions among parents, between parents and children and between parents and teachers or caregivers. Activities complementing the workshop (usually two two-hour sessions or a one-day parent retreat) include a mini-session ‘How To Tell Somebody Something They’d Rather Not Hear,’ a ‘Charm School’ manners fair and ‘Playroom Makeovers.’

Marketplace

The CWLA / Child Welfare League of America’s call for ‘creating parenting-rich communities’ demonstrates firm support for initiatives to help parents. Much such support, however, targets parents labeled ‘at risk’ or is linked with remedial efforts in mental health and criminal justice. Parents Forum, among programs that offer parent support in a positive context, is steadfastly volunteer-led. While we applaud growing support for investment in early childhood education, e.g. ‘ReadyNation’ focusing on that as a workforce development strategy, we note that this largely ignores parenting education. We therefore see most colleagues in this marketplace, including youth-serving agencies such a Boys & Girls Clubs, as prospective partners and clients for our low-cost, lasting-impact program.