Parenting Parenting Research

Parent Education in Minnesota and the University of Minnesota Extension Service

Minnesota is a geographically large state with a land area of about 87,000 square miles and a population of some 4.5 million. Educational programming for parents, especially parents of preschool children, is a substantial enterprise in the state of Minnesota and is increasing in other states. This programming takes many forms. The most popular and prevalent programming format is the offering of weekly series of four to eight small-group classes (10-15 parents). This format is used by Early Childhood Family Education (ECFE), Headstart, Minnesota Early Learning Design (MELD), Way to Grow and other learning readiness programs, some churches, some YMCAs or YWCAs, some Public Health Nursing departments, some county Social Services departments, some County Extension Offices, and others. ECFE is a voluntary, public school program that offers information and support to all Minnesota parents and their infants, toddlers, and preschoolers. The ECFE programs are staffed by licensed early childhood educators and licensed parent educators. Headstart is a program intended to assure learning readiness for children from low income families. MELD is a private agency that offers small-group education/support for parents from birth through age two.

The University of Minnesota has a long history and solid reputation in research, education, and outreach in the areas of family and child/youth development. A University Consortium on Children, Youth, and Families was established a few years ago to coherently coordinate and to serve as a single point of entry for community agencies or citizens to the varied competencies lodged in the 20 or so University departments and centers engaged in this work.. Research, classes, and outreach on parenthood or parent education are offered by at least six University units, including the Institute of Child Development (the top-ranked developmental psychology department in the country), the Family Social Science Department (the top-ranked family studies department in the country), the Family Education Department (which trains most licensed parent educators in the state), and the University of Minnesota Extension Service. This parenting work is informally coordinated by a University of Minnesota Parent Education Advisory Group.

State "Land-Grant" Universities in each of the 50 states have a three-fold mission—research, instruction, and outreach. The outreach function is largely performed by the Universities’ cooperative extension services—whose job is to keep abreast of the latest research, to interpret this research, and to disseminate it to farmers, businesses, professionals, communities, and families—through classes, workshops, conferences, printed materials, videos, mass media, newsletters, websites, teleconferences, and other means. The University of Minnesota Extension Service is widely known and highly regarded for its research-based parent education programming. In addition to the Positive Parenting project described in this chapter, Minnesota Extension has several other major parenting projects. Parents Forever is a curriculum, training program, and 5-6 week series of classes court-mandated for parents going through divorce. Dads Make a Difference is a curriculum and series of classes dealing with paternity and fathers’ roles, delivered to junior and senior high school youths. Parents Are Teachers is a program designed to help parents, schools, and community members understand key influences on children’s learning. Parent Connections is a support/discussion program for parents of adolescents, facilitated by trained volunteer leaders.

In the Positive Parenting project, the University of Minnesota Extension service largely played a "wholesaling" role—conducting, reviewing and summarizing research; developing video-based curricula and other educational materials; and training parent educators and family-professionals in the research foundation and use of the curricula. Project staff include the project director (Ronald Pitzer, a family sociologist and professor of social work), a video producer (Professor of Rhetoric), some 30 Extension faculty who reside and work in counties throughout Minnesota and Wisconsin, and consultants on subject matter content, educational design, marketing, and evaluation from the University of Minnesota Extension Service’s Communication and Educational Technology Services unit, and from several University of Minnesota and University of Wisconsin departments—including Consortium on Children, Youth, and Families; Institute of Child Development; Family Social Science; Social Work; Youth Studies; Department of Work, Community, and Family; Center for 4-H Youth Development; Public Health; and Department of Child and Family Studies (UW).

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