Single Parent Action Network (SPAN)
Key Facts
Location
Project Criteria
Project funding
£261,119
Funding round
SPAN is a nation-wide umbrella group that works with others to improve policies affecting one-parent families and single parents living in poverty and isolation. We develop courses that strengthen single parent self-help groups, provide a help-line and offer training and self-development courses to single parents. SPAN also administers small grants to support the development of networks and parenting courses. We are a charity and were set up in 1990.
We are using the Parenting Fund to increase the amount of parenting support available to isolated parents in the South West region of England. The South West Partnership for Strengthening Families - Strengthening Communities has been formed by Single Parent Action Network, the REU and Full Circle. The combination of skills and experience that the three agencies bring to the partnership provide support to grassroots trainers in the delivery of the OCN accredited Strengthening Families - Strengthening Communities course. We hope this leads to a step change in the provision of parenting support in the South West.
The partnership will:
- Increase access to quality parenting support for 'excluded' families in the region, including teenage mothers, lone parents, black and minority ethnic families, families with teenage children and families with experience of violence.
- Strengthen the capacity of smaller projects in disadvantaged communities to deliver culturally sensitive parenting education.
- Showcase a partnership model of delivering parenting education.
We expect this to lead to sustainable networks of parenting support beyond the life of the programme through:
- the training for 40 facilitators to deliver 'Strengthening Families - Strengthening Communities' to grassroots groups in the South West
- a Parenting Awards Programme supporting the delivery of REU courses to 20 self-help groups in deprived communities
- ademonstration project within St. Pauls, Bristol, led by Full Circle, on behalf of the St. Pauls Unlimited Community Partnership, piloting a multi-agency, user-led model for potential replication in other areas of the South West
- ahelp-line and support worker signposting parents experiencing particular difficulties to supportive groups, counselling and mentoring in their area
- the dissemination of demonstration models through regional forums, partnerships, national networks and SPAN's interactive website.