For two mothers in Kingston, the Boys’ Town Family Care Centre (FCC) has been a blessing.

Markeisha Brown and Kemesha Bromly have attended parenting sessions on the premises of the infant and primary school for the year the programme has officially been in operation.

They are among 32 parents, including five fathers, who are working to embody the centre’s motto “to resuscitate families, rescue generations and break cycles”.

Brown started attending the classes while pregnant with her son in 2018, and gave birth to him just before the centre opened in November.

“It has taught me a lot about how to deal with my son. At the time when I was just starting the centre, I had my cousin that I was babysitting. She was spoiled and the centre helped me to change her, and get her ready for school. And I was also pregnant, so it helped me in two different ways. To get her ready for school, and how to deal with my baby when he was born,” Brown shared.

A year later, Brown has transitioned from regular classes at the centre to continuing her education at the HEART TRUST/NSTA facility on Marcus Garvey Drive.

“I used to go three times a week for parenting sessions as well as for maths and English class. I’m not going right now as regularly as I used to go, but that’s because I’m doing an early childhood course at Garmex Academy. So, it has really helped me a lot. Everything that I learned, I see it coming out in my work right now,” Brown revealed.

Bromly, a mother of four, also took the opportunity to increase her academic qualifications.

Along with the parenting sessions, she enjoyed tutoring in English language at the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate level.

Introduced to the FCC at the Parent/Teachers’ Association meeting, Bromly said the centre has really helped her to function at home.

“From Monday to Thursday, I would go over the school to do the class. The parenting skills that they teach us help me to be better. Many people have changed since coming to the centre. There is a lady who used to handle her children a way. Every minute she lick them and since she come to the centre she learn how fi control harself and how fi treat har children,” she shared.

The Family Care Centre has been serving potential, new and experienced parents in the neighbouring Boys’ Town, Trench Town and Denham Town communities and founder Dr Christine Stennett revealed it is paving pathways in Jamaica with its programme.

“The FCC,” she elaborated, “is the only registered programme to host parents and children. There are intervention programmes that target either group, but we are the only one to target both. We use this programme to empower the parents, to encourage, and to demonstrate to them how to empower the children,” Dr Stennett said to the group.

The centre celebrated its first year with a large-format workshop on Friday, November 22, 2019.

The workshop afforded the cohort with sessions from Annette Richards, counselling psychologist; nurse Christine Lawrence; and Junior Rowe, principal and social worker at Riverton Early Childhood Centre.

Before the addresses, founder of the FCC Dr Christine Stennett and Anna Ward, executive director of the CB Facey Foundation (CBFF), the substantive sponsor of the centre, spoke to the parents.

For her and the group of volunteers who serve the parents from Monday to Thursday each week, seeing the change in their parenting practice was heartening.

Along with sessions to strengthen families and children, the FCC also offers educational/academic, psychosocial and economic training for the parents. The centre offers City & Guilds mathematics and English classes.

“One of the major achievements for us is getting our parents enrolled in HEART TRUST/NSTA programmes,” Dr Stennett shared. “Some never got an opportunity to finish school and now they are able to get serious training towards a career. Several are enrolled in childcare, cosmetology and food preparation training since becoming a part of the FCC.”

Ward, who runs the charitable arm of the PanJam Investment Limited, said it is important that the parents embrace lifelong learning.

“The FCC embodies so many values that we believe in at the CBFF — lifelong learning, integrity, paying it forward,” Ward said. “This is why we were on board from the inception of this project; to make sure that we could provide support for the parents of Boys’ Town and the surrounding communities.

“You have shown your commitment to be better and to do better for your children,” Ward finished.

Dr Stennett urged the parents in the group to pay it forward.

“We want you to go into your homes and be different; to lift the standards for the parents in Boys’ Town. We are here to serve the entire community, building one parent at a time,” Dr Stennett said.