Supporting Effective Parenting

Partnering with Parents
One of five “White Papers” on critical issues prepared by
Focus Five: Pennsylvania’s Campaign for Children and Families


Supporting Effective Parenting

Partnering with Parents

The Problem is Real

These days, the hardest – and most important – job in the world is to be a parent. But as difficult and vital as that job is, it is one for which society provides little support. Even on-the-job training is hard to come by.

Parents want the best for their children. But in Pennsylvania today, support for parents is lacking. Many parents could benefit from counseling, mentoring, information and other forms of support that can help prevent long-term social and family problems, saving money – and even lives – in the process.

This help in child rearing should be available to all and should take many forms. Until that ideal state is achieved, parent education and support should be made available initially to the families where the risk factors for the children are greatest. Research has demonstrated the effectiveness of this approach.

It is long-settled policy that the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania investigates upon receiving a report of child abuse or neglect; and intervenes when the allegations are proven. In law and in daily practice, Pennsylvania state government is responsible for protecting our children. The consensus about the importance of this protective role is manifested by annual expenditures of more than a billion dollars to respond to abuse, neglect or delinquent juvenile behavior.

Over the past two state administrations, Pennsylvania has begun a promising effort toward prevention of child abuse, neglect and delinquency by helping parents strengthen their parenting skills through programs that have proven to be effective. The next governor should act boldly for the welfare of our children by improving, unifying and extending these programs.

The next governor should expand these state-based initiatives to a significant portion of the families in which children are at greatest risk. Leadership is needed to continue this promising development of a prevention model using programs proven to produce better outcomes for children.

The support is there for the next Governor to act boldly to bolster effective parenting and produce better child outcomes. In recent polls, the public has expressed profound concerns about the state of parenting and the status of our children, while demonstrating sympathy for the challenges facing parents today.

With strong gubernatorial leadership, Pennsylvania can take the sensible and efficient path of prevention before rather than reaction after there is abuse, neglect or a youth in trouble with the law. Helping parents build skills and confidence will reduce the number of victims; reduce the human and financial toll on the commonwealth; break the cycle of abuse, neglect, delinquency and other risks; and bring about lasting change.

Abused or neglected children are more likely to be arrested as juveniles, more likely to be arrested as adults, and more likely to commit a violent crime. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

Parenting skills do not come naturally. “If only they came with a manual,” could be the refrain of parents when confronted with a crying infant. Indeed many parents, especially first-time parents of infants and toddlers, can benefit greatly from parent education and other supports. Research has shown that parental support programs can have a real, measurable impact on the incidence of child abuse and neglect.

The first three years of life are especially important in the brain development of children. During this time, children are exceptionally responsive to parental and family support that helps them achieve positive outcomes and avoid negative ones. Despite the significance of this early development, many children under age three face one or more of the risk factors that hamper development, such as poverty, inadequate health care, isolated parents (e.g. single parents, at-risk parents without supports, etc.), inadequate or substandard child care, and insufficient parental attention.

In Pennsylvania the number of children facing one or more risk factors is significant:

· One child in six lives in poverty.[1]

· The parents of one in four children are without full-time, year-round employment.[2]

· One in six rural Pennsylvania households is headed by a single mother[3] and one in three births in Pennsylvania is to a single mother.[4]

· One in 12 Pennsylvania children lack health insurance.[5]

· More than 22,000 reports of child abuse were filed in Pennsylvania in 1999; children were removed from the home in more than 8,000 such cases that year.[6]

These risks confront children in both urban and rural settings. For example, one in six rural Pennsylvania children live in poverty and one in six is born to a mother with less than a high school education.[7]

A study by Kids Count determined that 283,000 children in Pennsylvania – about 10% of all the state’s children – were considered “high-risk.”[8] These high-risk children face four or more of six widely-recognized risk factors: (1) living in a single parent household; (2) a head of household without a high school degree; (3) living in poverty; (4) unemployed parent; (5) family receiving welfare; and (6) no health insurance.

The challenge for children to overcome these risk factors is great, and many cannot overcome them:

· Nationally, one in three children reach kindergarten without basic learning skills.[9]

· One in ten births is to a teen mother.[10]

· About 22,000 Pennsylvania teens drop out of school each year.[11]

· There were 107,000 arrests of juveniles in Pennsylvania in 1999: over 22,000 were for serious crimes and nearly 5,000 were for violent crimes.[12]

Child abuse, in particular, carries long-term consequences. Abused or neglected children are:

· 53 percent more likely to be arrested as juveniles,[13]

· 38 percent more likely to be arrested as adults, and

· 38 percent more likely to commit a violent crime.[14]

It is important, then, that we help parents build upon their strengths and improve child development as a counterbalance to these many risks facing so many Pennsylvania children.

Focus Five for Kids is committed to bringing real change to the system, so the state can partner with parents and help them find the knowledge and resources they need to do right by their children. We are committed to investing in the success of children and families on the front end, rather than paying for failure on the back end.

Toward that end, the Focus Five coalition calls for more state support for proven or promising initiatives that:

· Increase the confidence and competence of parents of young children;

· Improve child development and other child outcomes;

· Reduce abuse, neglect and other expensive failures that are tragic for children, costly for taxpayers, promote crime and violence and perpetuate the cycle.

Focus Five for Kids calls on the candidates for Governor of Pennsylvania to commit to a greater emphasis on preventive family support services that:

· parents perceive as a helpful partner, not a harmful intruder

· engage and support parents to be effective as a child’s first teacher

· coordinate various program approaches for maximum efficiency and effectiveness

· adequately fund programs that are proven to be effective and produce a return on investment

· emphasize measurable child and parent outcomes

· permit counties to use their state funding to implement local prevention programs that are proven to improve the lives of children

The Solution is Clear

While parents cannot prevent all detrimental conditions, it is undeniable that parents and families have a profound influence on children and their development. Whether it is a traditional two-parent family, a single mother or father, or a combination of adults and children who live together, that “family unit” is how every person first experiences life. The family is a child’s first source of knowledge and the prototype for how a child learns about relationships. To improve the well-being of children and their opportunities for future success in school and the workplace, we must start by partnering with parents.

Existing literature and research show that parental and family supports are important to the well being of children and their families. There is strong evidence that effective parent and family support programs contribute to:[15]

· Fewer incidents of child abuse and neglect

· Fewer teenage pregnancies

· Less juvenile delinquency

· Improved behavior, school performance and educational achievement

· More families moving from welfare to work

· Increased knowledge of child development, and improved parenting skills among adults

· Greater educational attainment among parents

Research has also proven that family support programs save taxpayers money. A series of studies in New York, Michigan, Colorado and Pennsylvania found that such preventive programs pay for themselves in reduced government intervention costs, and over time save money.[16]

Experience demonstrates that parents listen to and turn to teachers, health care providers and other professionals to answer their questions. That information can bolster parents’ ability to better meet their children’s health and developmental needs. That is why any initiative to support parents and families should include two particular strategies that have been subjected to research and proven effective in improving parenting skills and improving outcomes for children: home visits by nurses and family resource centers. In addition, because family income and economic stability play such a major role in the level of risk a child faces, tax strategies to increase the take-home income of working parents are another essential component of parent and family support efforts.

Home Visiting Programs

Nurse home visiting programs bring professionals into the home to deliver valuable health and parenting information to first-time, at-risk parents. This in-home, one-on-one contact offers information in a non-threatening setting. Expectant mothers can receive health care, help to quit smoking, child development information and more. The research[17] shows that effective home visiting programs have many valuable advantages, including:

· Improved parenting skills

· Reductions in parents’ dependence on public assistance

· Better birth outcomes

· Reductions in child abuse

· School success and decreased likelihood of later delinquency for children

While home visitation programs can differ depending on the families served and other factors, they all focus on the importance of children’s early years and the fact that parents play a key role as the “child’s first teacher.” They also share the perspective that in some cases taking services to young families in their homes is more effective than expecting them to seek out services outside the home.

Parenting programs have a twin impact – they improve outcomes for children and for parents. For example, 22 years of research on the Prenatal and Infancy Home Visitation by Nurses program found that the program was effective in improving pregnancy outcomes, the child’s health and development and the mother’s personal development. More specifically, families participating in the program had:

· 79% fewer verified reports of child abuse and neglect

· 30 fewer months on welfare

· 44% fewer maternal problems relating to alcohol and drug abuse

· 56% fewer arrests of the children as they grew older[18]

Family Resource Centers
Family resource centers, like home visitation programs, have been proven by research to be effective in improving the chances for success of both children and parents. Family resource centers offer parent education, training, and other needed services to help parents become self-sufficient and provide opportunities for their children. Benefits that flow from these programs include: [19]

· Increased family education levels

· Increased family employment and participation in education courses

· Full, on-schedule immunizations for children

· Links to preventive health care

· Improved parenting skills

· Reduced recidivism for child abuse incidents

Family centers, which are often linked to or sited in schools, are founded on the belief that strong families and communities are essential to a young child’s well-being and likelihood of success in school and beyond.

Tax Strategies

Parenting and family support programs, as effective as they are, will only be enhanced in concert with efforts to increase incomes of families in or near poverty. Poverty can undermine later-life success, according to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS). In fact, socio-economic status is the most compelling predictor of children’s cognitive skills at school entry, the NAS reports. That, in turn, is a long-term indicator of academic achievement, drop-out rates and adult literacy.

That’s why tax programs that allow low-income families to keep more of their wages, like the federal Earned Income Tax Credit and Pennsylvania’s “Tax Back” program, are so important. They allow low-income working families to use their own income to help provide a better life for their children. These programs are especially important in Pennsylvania, since there are close to 600,000 children in families considered to be “working poor.”[20]

The federal Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is a tax benefit for low and moderate income working families. Through the EITC, families get all or part of their tax payments back. Families with lower incomes get extra cash back from the federal government. Families with two children can qualify for the EITC if their incomes are as high as $32,121. In 2000, nearly 663,000 Pennsylvania families received more than $1 billion in EITC tax benefits.

Tax Back is Pennsylvania’s new name for the special provision that waives the state’s 2.8 percent personal income tax for low-income individuals and families. Under Governor Schweiker’s proposed 2002-03 budget, a two-parent, two-child family can earn $31,000 and pay no income tax.

While many families take advantage of the tax break, many other low-income parents don’t know they qualify, or can’t negotiate the process. Increased utilization by eligible families, along with an increase in the income threshold, would help more children in need.

The Need is Great

The research is irrefutable: investments in parenting and family support programs help both children and parents. This conclusion is becoming more widely recognized across Pennsylvania.

· For more than a decade, Pennsylvania has funded Family Centers. There are currently 48 centers statewide, in 30 of the state’s 67 counties. These programs have been level-funded for the past six years and no expansion funding has been available to expand this resource to the other 37 counties.

· The state is now directly funding nurse home visitation programs. Governor Schweiker announced grants worth $7.2 million for 16 programs last December (Commitment of $21 million over three years).

· The state has funded 33 Parent Child Home Programs for improving literacy skills across the state. $12 million was proposed to be spent by 2005.

· Communities ranging from Philadelphia to rural Somerset County are using various funding streams to pay for their own family centers and home visitation programs.