Parent Leadership Development Workshops

Agents of Transformation Training Series

"Community Mobilization for the Wellâ€being of Children, Youth and Families"

Agents of Transformationâ€AOTwill provide an opportunity to increase the individual and collective advocacy skills needed in order to be effective "family driven" change agents. This curriculum will strengthen parent/caregiver skills to lead their own child and family needs and treatment planning; expand the workforce of knowledgeable family advocates within family organizations, provider agencies and advocacy groups; and enhance the leadership skills needed to transform local and state policy. This training will provide participants with the tools to improve outcomes in meeting the social, emotional health, and wellbeing of all children, youth and families in Rhode Island. This 12 hour training series will provide new information, interactive exercises and discussion to address the following:

• Recognize parent leadership

• Value Diversity

• Create Dialogue

• Individual advocacy skills

• Peer support and natural supports

• Wraparound model

• Navigate the interacting child and family services and systems

• Introduce the branches of government, state policy and budgeting

• Facilitation and Public conflict resolution

• Grassroots organizing and collective change for policy and system reform

Call PSN for upcoming training dates in your community!

Introduction to Parent Leadership

This workshop is an introduction for parents and caregivers to become lead advocates and decisionâ€makers for their children. Participants will learn strategies for increasing their capacity to build on the unique strengths and needs of their own child and family and how to improve services and systems for children and families in Rhode Island. Come gain self confidence, meet other parent leaders, and learn how you can continue a journey of parent leadership development.

June 24â€6:00â€8:00 PM

or

July 15â€6:00â€8:00 PM

At PSN

To register or for more information on upcoming parent leadership development opportunities, please contact Parent Support Network at:

467â€6855/800â€483â€8844

www.psnri.org

1395 Atwood Avenue,

Suite114

Johnston, RI 02919

Peer Mentor Training

The Peer Mentor Training will provide an opportunity to learn more about the idea and practice of mentoring, including its purpose and ways in which it takes place. The training will focus on the skills and qualities needed to be a peer mentor, and will help participants acquire and demonstrate skills through reflection, discussion and practical exercises. Participants will learn about relevant policies and procedures, such as those relating to confidentiality, recognizing crisis, and reporting. Participants will learn about peer mentor workforce opportunities within family organizations and agencies across Rhode Island.

A peer mentor is an experienced family member who is parenting or fostering children or youth who are at risk, who have special needs and/or serious emotional, behavioral, and/or mental health challenges. Peer mentors provide support, education and advocacy within a structured oneâ€toâ€one relationship with another family member. They offer nonâ€judgmental support from a position of empathy as family members themselves. Peer Mentors are helpful as they understand families have various child and family needs across the life domains they are trying to balance.

IMPORTANT INFORMATION

ABOUT LAWFULLY RESIDING IMMIGRANT CHILDREN

AND RITE CARE

Effective April 1, 2010, most lawfully present immigrant children are eligible for Medical Assistance (including RIte Care, RIte Share and Katie Beckett).

Children who are lawful permanent residents (green card holders) no longer have to wait five years to apply for coverage (no five year bar).

Children and parents who are refugees or asylees have been and continue to be eligible for Medical Assistance.

Children in other immigration categories, such as temporary protected status (TPS) and deferred enforced departure (DED), also are eligible.

Children must be under age 19 and otherwise eligible for Medical Assistance.

Notes

§ Medical Assistance coverage for parents is available for lawful permanent residents who have been in that status for at least 5 years.

§ Medical Assistance coverage is not available for children who are undocumented.

Families who would like help applying for RIte Care/RIte Share can contact a Family Resource Counselor (FRC).

FRCs help families apply for RIte Care/RIte Share. FRCs explain the application, help with paperwork

§ and help solve problems with applications that may arise. FRC services are offered free of charge.

§ FRCs also screen families for other benefit programs, such as cash assistance, SNAP (Food Stamps), WIC and child care assistance.

§ FRCs cannot actually enroll children in RIte Care/RIte Share. The FRCs send the application to the Rhode Island Department of Human Services, which processes the application and determines whether children (and parents) are eligible. FRCs cannot recommend a RIte Care health plan.

§ Some FRCs offer evening appointments and some speak languages other than English.

§ Call for an appointment. FRCs are located at community health centers and hospitals across Rhode Island. To find an FRC, call the Rhode Island Health Center Association at (401) 274-1771 ext. 217. FRC lists also are available at www.rihca.org and www.dhs.ri.gov.

[1]Children and parents who are refugees or asylees have been and continue to be eligible for Medical Assistance.

_________________________________________________

HarvardUniversityAnnouncement: No tuition and No Student Loans

HarvardUniversityannounced over the weekend that, from now on, undergraduate students from low-income families will pay no tuition. In making the announcement, Harvard's president Lawrence H. Summers said, "When only ten percent of the students in elite higher education come from families in the lower half of the income distribution, we are not doing enough. We are not doing enough in bringing elite higher education to the lower half of the income distribution."

If you know of a family earning less than $60,000 a year with an honor student graduating from high school soon, Harvard University wants to pay the tuition. The prestigious university recently announced that from now on undergraduate students from low-income families can go to Harvard for free... no tuition and no student loans!

To find out more about Harvard offering free tuition for families making less than $60,000 a year, visit Harvard's financial aid website at: http://www.fao.fas.harvard.edu/ or call the school's financial aid office at (617) 495-1581.

Universityof Rhode Island Feinstein Providence Campus Presents,

URI Development Program latest schedule for the following classes:

For more information or to register, please call the URI Special Programs Office at 401-277-5200 or emailbbb@uri.edu.

Microsoft Office 2007 Certificate Program

All hands-on computer seminarsare conducted in the latest Microsoft Office 2007 environment. In addition to sharpening your computer skills, you will experience a new, different setting, and come away with helpful handouts filled with instructions, shortcuts, and tips. You will also receive a Certificate of Completion for each class.

Microsoft Office Computer Workshops & Certificate Program

Grant Writing Workshop

Microsoft Office Computer Workshops & Certificate Program 80 Washington Street, Providence, RI

You may sign up for the full 5 day program, (one full day a week for 5 weeks), or separate, individual classes for any application. Classes meet at 9am at the URI/Alan Shawn Feinstein College of Continuing Education, 80 Washington Street, Providence, RI.

Fee: $180 per day; $900 for full program, includes course handouts, computer access, free parking (RI Convention Ctr.)

Certificateswill be distributed upon completion of the program. For more information or to register, please call the URI Special Programs Office at 401-277-5200 or emailbbb@uri.edu.

80 Washington Street, Providence, RI

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This Is Not The Story You Think It is… A Season of Unlikely Happiness
Laura Munson, one of the Good Men Project's favorite authors, reads from her recently published memoir, This Is Not the Story You Think It Is...A Season of Unlikely Happiness, April 8 at 7 pm at Borders in Chestnut Hill, Mass. The book originated from a New York Times Modern Love column that Munson wrote last year. "It was about a rough patch in my marriage and how I responded to my husband's proclamation of disaffection-his telling me that he wasn't sure he loved me anymore-by saying I didn't buy it," Munson writes about the column. "I felt instead that it was his own crisis of self, and that my work was to get out of his way, to control what I could control, commit to non-suffering, and let go of the rest. My job at that time, and all the time really, is to be responsible for my own wellbeing, regardless of what's at hand."

"Sincere, ambitious and nearly always engaging, these stories will touch familiar chords in men."
The MetroWest Daily News

Buy the Book | DVD | Companion Set

"Men Can: The Changing Image & Reality of Fatherhood in America," can now be
(pre) ordered through Amazon:

http://donunger.com/booknews.htm

Ships by 28 May; in your mailbox for Father's Day

"Unger presents his arguments about the need for fathers to more fully embrace their role-which is central to children's healthy development-in a way that is both objective and refreshingly intimate and personal. Men CAN has much to offer readers, with its well-organized and powerful narratives of men struggling to find their way in society's new openness and reliance upon fathers to be primary parents, not just breadwinners."

-Jonathan Diamond, author of "Fatherless Sons: Healing the Legacy of Loss"


Donald N.S. Unger, MFA, PhD
Lecturer, Program in Writing and Humanistic Studies Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 12-112 donunger@mit.edu
(O) 617.324.2371

www.donunger.com
http://donunger.com/booknews.htm
www.hydrocarbsanon.blogspot.com

_________________________________________________

Fathers Gain Respect From Experts (and Mothers) By LAURIE TARKAN

"In the last 20 years, everyone's been talking about how important it

> is for fathers to be involved," said Sara S. McLanahan, a professor of

> sociology and public affairs at Princeton. "But now the idea is that

> the better the couple gets along, the better it is for the child."

>

> Her research, part of a project based at Princeton and called the

> Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, found that when couples

> scored high on positive relationship traits like willingness to

> compromise, expressing affection or love for their partner,

> encouraging or helping partners to do things that were important to

> them, and having an absence of insults and criticism, the father was

> significantly more likely to be engaged with his children.

> . . . . In recent years, several fathers' rights organizations have

> offered father-only parenting programs and groups, and studies have

> shown that these help men become more responsive and engaged with their children.

>

> But a new randomized, controlled study conducted by the Pruetts and

> the Cowans found that the families did even better if mothers were

> brought into the picture.

>

> In the study, low-income couples were randomly placed into a

> father-mother group, a father-only group and a control group of

> couples. The controls were given one information session; the other

> two groups met for 16 weeks at family resource centers in California, discussing various parental issues.

>

> . . . . notably, the families in the couples group did best. They had

> less parental stress and more marital happiness than the other parents

> studied, suggesting that the critical difference was not greater

> involvement by the fathers in child-rearing but greater emotional support between couples.

Fathers Gain Respect From Experts (and Mothers) By LAURIE TARKAN

It used to irk Melissa Calapini when her 3-year-old daughter, Haley, hung around her father while he fixed his cars. Ms. Calapini thought there were more enriching things the little girl could be doing with her time.

But since the couple attended a parenting course ­ to save their relationship, which had become overwhelmed by arguments about rearing their children ­ Ms. Calapini has had a change of heart. Now she encourages the father-daughter car talk.

"Daddy's bonding time with his girls is working on cars," said Ms. Calapini, of Olivehurst, Calif. "He has his own way of communicating with them, and that's O.K."

As much as mothers want their partners to be involved with their children, experts say they often unintentionally discourage men from doing so. Because mothering is their realm, some women micromanage fathers and expect them to do things their way, said Marsha Kline Pruett, a professor at the Smith College School for Social Work at Smith College and a co-author of the new book "Partnership Parenting," with her husband, the child psychiatrist Dr.

Kyle Pruett (Da Capo Press).

Yet a mother's support of the father turns out to be a critical factor in his involvement with their children, experts say ­ even when a couple is divorced.

"In the last 20 years, everyone's been talking about how important it is for fathers to be involved," said Sara S. McLanahan, a professor of sociology and public affairs at Princeton. "But now the idea is that the better the couple gets along, the better it is for the child."

Her research, part of a project based at Princeton and called the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, FOUND THAT WHEN COUPLES SCORED HIGH on positive relationship traits like willingness to compromise, expressing affection or love for their partner, encouraging or helping partners to do things that were important to them, and having an absence of insults and criticism, THE FATHER WAS SIGNIFICANTLY MORE LIKELY TO BE ENGAGED WITH HIS CHILDREN.

Uninvolved fathers have long been accused of lacking motivation. But research shows that many societal obstacles conspire against them. Even as more fathers are changing diapers, dropping the children off at school and coaching soccer, they are often pushed aside in ways large and small.

"The walls in family resource centers are pink, there are women's magazines in the waiting room, the mother's name is on the files, and the home visitor asks for the mother if the father answers the door," said Philip A. Cowan, an emeritus professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, who along with his wife, Carolyn Pape Cowan, has conducted decades of research on families. "It's like fathers are not there."

In recent years, SEVERAL FATHERS' RIGHTS ORGANIZATIONS HAVE OFFERED FATHER-ONLY PARENTING PROGRAMS AND GROUPS, and studies have shown that these help men become more responsive and engaged with their children.

BUT A NEW RANDOMIZED, CONTROLLED STUDY CONDUCTED BY THE PRUETS AND THE COWANS FOUND THAT THE FAMILIES DID EVEN BETTER IF MOTHERS WERE BROUGHT INTO THE PICTURE.

In the study, low-income couples were randomly placed into a father-mother group, a father-only group and a control group of couples. The controls were given one information session; the other two groups met for 16 weeks at family resource centers in California, discussing various parental issues.

In both of those groups, the researchers found, the fathers not only spent more time with their children than the controls did but were also more active in the daily tasks of child-rearing. They became more emotionally involved with their children, and the children were much less aggressive, hyperactive, depressed or socially withdrawn than children of fathers in the control group.

But NOTABLY, THE FAMILIES IN THE COUPLES GROUP DID BEST. They had less parental stress and more marital happiness than the other parents studied, suggesting that the critical difference was not greater involvement by the fathers in child-rearing but greater emotional support between couples.

"The study emphasizes the importance of couples' figuring parenting out together and accepting the different ways of parenting," Dr. Kline Pruett said.

Fathers tend to do things differently, Dr. Kyle Pruett said, but not in ways that are worse for the children. Fathers do not mother, they father.

Dr. Kyle Pruett added: "Dads tend to discipline differently, use humor more and use play differently. Fathers want to show kids what's going on outside their mother's arms, to get their kids ready for the outside world." To that end, he said, they tend to encourage risk-taking and problem-solving.

The study was financed by the California Office of Child Abuse Prevention, which is looking for ways to involve fathers more at the state's many family resource centers. Experts say improving the way fathers are treated in many settings, public and private, is an important public health goal.

The New York Times Nov 3, 2009

NACCRRA and the United States Military Services

Supporting Our Nation's Military Families and Strengthening Child Care

NACCRRA, a National Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies , is working with the U.S. Military Services to help those who serve in the military find and afford child care that suits their needs. Through several innovative civilian/military efforts between services, NACCRRA, Options for Working Families and other child care resource and referral agencies, are building the quality and capacity of child care throughout the country.

For an explanation of military services involved in this effort, and to apply for affordable child care, please call Options directly or click here to find out more.