A Ministry of Education umbrella programme designed to pull together all institutions now offering parenting services in a more effective and collaborative way across the country has received high marks from parents, according to the president of the National Parent/Teachers' Association of Jamaica (NPTAJ) Marcia McCausland-Wilson.

Speaking at the weekly Observer Monday Exchange meeting of reporters and editors at the newspaper's Corporate Area offices yesterday, McCausland-Wilson said parents have welcomed the Parent Places — neutral and designated areas in communities where parents can get access to information on parenting, courses and workshops and support from other parents.

"One of the issues facing parents is that at least 200 children leave home every month. That, of course, is alarming. What it says is that something is wrong at home, they are being ill-treated, beaten, sexually abused. All of these things are now coming to the fore. So my parents, when we interact with them, they welcome these policies that are coming out from the Ministry of Education. The NPTAJ is ready to help with the implementation because we go one-on-one with the parents," McCausland-Wilson said.

Yesterday, Janet Brown, vice-president of Parenting Partners Caribbean and co-ordinator of the Parent Places project, said surveys have shown that most of the parents, when asked where they were likely to seek help for parenting problems, said "nowhere", while others said churches and clinics. She said it was hoped that the designating of parenting places would widen access to help.

Brown, who told the meeting that already some 35 applications have been received for interested entrants into the Parent Places programme, said entities wishing to become a part of the programme can apply, while noting that there were conditions.

"One of those requirements would see interested applicants at least providing one course per year for 20 hours or more for parents. It must have a behaviour change component, it must be in a neutral area," she outlined.

Brown said while participating Parent Places would not all be equipped to offer intense, highly diagnostic or therapeutic care, they would be able to refer parents needing these services.

In the meantime, Brown said while the initiative has been met with "a lot of enthusiasm" it would require technical support. She said the drivers of the programme are depending on the goodwill of persons to get the needed technical support teams together.

Dr Rebecca Tortello, senior advisor to the minister of education, said the programme will be among the highlights of celebrations of Parent Month, which starts today.

"We have developed a national standard for parenting programme content and delivery because what we know is that we have a plethora of parenting programmes but what we have is variation in the quality of the offering. So now we have been mapping the parenting programmes that currently exist, we have created standards through consultations and we have crafted a strategy," she told the Exchange.

She said this strategy would be outlined during the launching ceremony for Parent Month activities this Thursday.

Dr Tortello has, in the meantime, emphasised that the "idea of a Parent Place is not to spend money creating new institutions and building new locations but to better resource existing locations".

"The idea is that... no parent will be able to say they didn't know where to go for help. We are trying to hit parenting on all fronts," she said.

Yesterday, Dr Tortello, in making it clear that the Government would not be able to take on the funding for these institutions, said the organisations would foot the majority of their costs as before but would be assisted with material resources. She said the ministry would also be harnessing the skills of social workers, guidance councillors, victim support personnel and government organisations already in the field.

"They understand that the Government cannot take on everything," she said, noting that parish libraries are among the 35 interested agencies, all of which have had their collections audited to determine the amount of parenting material available to them. In the meantime, she said the level of literacy of parents had been taken into consideration and emphasised that the support material was not intended to be text-heavy, in order that parents who are not schooled will be able to assist their children.

In addition, software has also been developed to help with adult literacy challenges within the programme.

In pointing out that "parenting is becoming more and more recognised as critical to both academic progress and national development" Dr Tortello said since last year the National Parenting Support Policy has been tabled in Parliament while the Bill to create the National Parenting Support Commission, which will be the implementing agency for the policy, has also gone through all the processes and is waiting to be tabled in Parliament.

"On the policy front we are moving forward," she added.

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