THE advocacy group Hear the Children’s Cry is calling for more support for parents even as the country focuses on the needs, rights and welfare of our children during Child Month 2023.

According to Hear the Children’s Cry, there needs to be simultaneous support for the many parents who need practical advice about the difficult job of parenting, with a special focus on single-parent households this month which is marked as Child Month.

“Our work with parent groups over many years has shown us that parents want their children to succeed and to have a better life than theirs. However, what we oftentimes see is that the parents themselves need support – people they can talk to and get advice from about their children, particularly the adolescents in the home,” said Hear The Children’s Cry founder Betty Ann Blaine.

“This is even more important among the mothers and fathers who are raising children as single parents. And even when the single parent finds another partner, ‘step-parenting’ and blended families can be very challenging.

“Hear The Children’s Cry believes that a lot of resources reside in our neighbourhoods, and that we can use our various experiences to help each other. We urge communities to come together, in the same way many citizens have got together to support neighbourhood watch and other collaborative activities. Let us form community parent groups,” urged Blaine.

She argued that older neighbours can offer child rearing experience while younger parents can help older ones raising grandchildren to negotiate the challenges of modern technology, and all can help keep the neighbourhood children safe.

Blaine and her team are also calling for closer cooperation between schools and parents, not only for the welfare of the individual students but also as a tool to reduce the growing levels of violence in Jamaican schools.

“Hear The Children Cry believes that the problem of violence in schools can be solved by school, child and parent working together in an ongoing relationship. As we have always believed, ‘If we fix family life, we will fix the nation and save the children,’ ” declared Blaine.

In wishing every Jamaican child a happy and peaceful Child Month Blaine extended congratulations to the National Child Month Committee which celebrates its 70th year of raising awareness about children’s rights and needs, as well as challenging Jamaica’s adults with innovative ways of supporting the children.