African Families Support Services
Key Facts
Location
Project Criteria
Project funding
£98,587
Funding round
African Families Support Services working in partnership with Croydon Women's Support Group situated on: 310 Day Lewis House, 324 Besham Lane, Thornton Heath
Surrey CR7 7EO will be developing a parenting support project known as: POSITIVE PARENTING within the London Borough of Crodyon.
Target group: black African and Afro-Caribbean families living in Corydon. This group will include single parents, male parents/lone fathers both young and adults, parents with teenage children, parents of children with challenging and anti social behaviour, abusing drugs/alcohol engaged in criminal activities, parents with children in prison, foster parents/carers, step parents, parents of children on social services risk register and facing school exclusion, parents with terminal illness and those parenting under difficult circumstances.
Aims:
To improve parenting skills through provision of information and sharing experiences, ideas, mentoring and offering support.
To develop consistent, preventive and responsive services to enable parents to support their children appropriately.
Objectives:
Set up monthly support groups of parents bringing together parents to explore and discuss issues under different strands as mentioned above and explore options. These meetings will be used as parenting classes and at times professionals will be brought in to facilitate and offer guidance.
Telephone Advise Line: This will be set up at Croydon Women's Support Group offices to provide information to parents who will ring in requiring support and advice.
Peer Support and Parent Mentoring: Some parents will be trained to mentor others e.g. young parents including young fathers, male parents, step parents, foster parents, recent arrivals from abroad etc. This will be provided through one to one, on outreach basis and peer support. A parents Response Network will be set up training parents to respond to each others needs.
Quarterly information days: This will bring together different parents together to discuss issues. Intergenerational discussions will be set up betwen children and parents and issues will be communicated through drama, role plays etc..
Fathers Support Group: This will help fathers, men to explore issues which affect them as fathers e.g. lack of male role models, rights of male parents, absent fathers etc.
Other activities; We will encourage parents and their children to get involved in activities provided by the two agencies as well as making referrals to other agencies and services for support, sharing and learning.
Parents Conference; This will take place at the end of the project for evaluation, providing feedback and sharing good practice.
Expected Outcomes:
Above programmes and activities will provide information, support, sharing, learning, networks, advice, mentoring and peer support, guidance etc for parents and their children.
Target communities will be helped to take a critical analysis of their roles as parents so as to flex their practice, learn new ways of parenting and be able to support their children appropriately.
Support and services will reach to those who have not been receiving them e.g. young and adult male fathers, recent arrivals, parents stigmatised by the acts of their chidlren e.g. who children are in prison, abuse drugs etc
Good communication will be established between parents themselves and their children thereby reducing family break-up, children leaving home prematurely, safer neighbourhoods.
There will be increased community networks and support
Better sharing of information and good practice among agencies
More available support for different
strands of parents, resulting in openness in addressing issues and accessing appropriate services.
More interaction between statutory and voluntary sector e.g. social services, police, schools etc.