International parenting approaches

Carolyn and I attended a conference on Tuesday which had been organised by Parenting UK and the Wave Trust. Speakers gave presentations about the Leksand approach in Sweden, Kraamzorg work in Holland and the Community Mothers Programme in Ireland. What was particularly impressive from our point of view was the Leksand focus on fathers and the ability of statutory and non-statutory Swedish agencies to work together. We intend to find out how successful the approach has been in reaching and working with Swedish ‘U-Too’ dads.

A Dad Is Born

Two programmes in two days. Let’s hope this is the beginning of a national dialogue about fatherhood, and the importance of fathers, as well as mothers, in the lives of their children. What was particularly striking was the admission by one of the three men that the negative experience he’d had of being fathered had a strong impact on his attitude to becoming a father. Similarly one of the men in the previous night’s programme was concerned that he might replicate his own father’s hurtful behaviour. These impacts are identical to those acknowledged by all the young men with whom we’ve worked. It would not be difficult to conclude that fathers matter, for good or ill. As a society we just need to minimise the ‘ill’ bit. Easily said ...

Daddy Daycare

Because mainstream television programmes about fathers are such rare events, any programme focussing on fatherhood has to be welcomed. But it was disappointing that last night’s programme seemed a set up job. It was unrealistic to expect any lay person to appear competent in the scenarios presented to the dads. Indeed a cynic might think that the single mothers running the nursery had a vested interest in demonstrating that, as fathers didn’t have the necessary skills, they were not really needed. To say that the men were being “patronised" is inappropriate in the circumstances, being “matronised” might describe their circumstances more accurately.

Co-operation between men and women in the care of children, avoiding stereotypes, might be a more fruitful topic to televise. Hopefully tonight’s BBC 2 programme will be an improvement.

Getting a mention

It’s good to see the links to so many organisations that are working with fathers on THE MEN’s NETWORK. These can be found at http://brightonmanplan.wordpress.com/2012/02/12/has-the-world-gone-dad/, including a link to this blog.

It looks like John has been consulting for Channel 4 because tonight’s Daddy Daycare programme looks like it’s using his ideas. ‘Bout time too. Woman’s Hour also had a ‘dads’ piece today so it’s beginning to look like fatherhood issues are inching up the agenda. ‘Bout time too (again). But, like the Daily Mail, the programme used the dread ‘single mother’ phrase, failing to recognise that for every 'single mother’ there’s a ‘single father’ and that children need both parents.

Men and Boys Conference

It’s been a while since my last post, mainly because I wanted the news about our course to be seen as soon as visitors opened our link. But stuff HAS been happening. A couple of agencies have already acquired the licence to use the course and others are interested. And at the beginning of November Carolyn and I went to the first Men and Boys Conference in Brighton. We put some U-Too news on display boards, gave a talk about the course and met old friends, including Melvyn Davies, who John will remember, and Rob Williams from the Fatherhood Institute, who Den has met.

Rob has arranged for news about the course to appear in The Fatherhood Institute’s next email and I’m helping to put together a list of organisations working with fathers. The idea is that eventually a network of such organisations will be created to lobby for more resources for work with men and boys, and for fathers in particular.

"Preparation for Fatherhood" course

Carolyn and I met with Chris Latham this morning. Chris is Development Manager for the Open College Network's south-western region (OCNSWR). We worked out what we need to do next to try to get the course accredited. The following discussion of the issues involved appears on page 4 of the CSJ's response to Frank Field's report.

Coming alongside young fathers-to-be

There are few programmes to help young fathers-to-be, although Graham Allen made the point that ‘Health and early years services need to do more to ensure that expectant mother and fathers are offered high-quality community-based preparation for parenthood that includes learning about the needs of babies during pregnancy and early life and how to make the successful transition to parenthood.’

U-Too, a 2010 CSJ poverty-fighting Award winner runs such programmes to help young fathers-to-be. It used the Award money to fund a rewrite of their course so that it could gain accreditation and be made available to other agencies that would then be eligible for funding. Although they completed the rewrite using National Open College Network’s Progression Units, the current restructuring of acceptable qualifications might mean that the Units used are no longer available. If this is the case, they will fail to receive accreditation. Smaller organisations who are trying to establish the validity of a programme and have designed it according to recognised tenets, may still struggle to obtain the necessary accreditation for a variety of reasons that have nothing to do with programme effectiveness.

The complete CSJ response can be found at:

http://www.centreforsocialjustice.org.uk/client/downloads/2011182_CSJresponse_childpovertyconsultation.pdf

Young dads-to-be course

Carolyn and I met with Valerie Hall on Monday. Valerie is a Quality Reviewer for the National Open College Network (NOCN). Valerie confirmed that the course we've rewritten is at the upper end of the requirements for a Level 1 Award, which is good news. Even better is that she thought it's user friendly, not patronising, and gives participants ownership of their own learning. Best of all, Den and Mark feel quite envious of anyone who does the new course because they both wish they could have done it instead of our original version!

But there's a problem. The course is linked to five NOCN progression units which we now learn may not be available after the end of July. So we're going to see if we can make it a stand-alone qualification. We're going to meet with Chris Latham, our regional NOCN Development Manager, in early March to see what can be worked out. Watch this space!

Silver Stars

Jenny, Lisa Den and Steven were presented with their Silver Arts Award certificates by the Mayor of Swindon, Cllr Rex Barnett, at last Tuesday's Presentation Evening at The Platform. This represents a considerable achievement for all four, but especially for Den and Lisa, both of whom had left school with no GCSEs. So it's a reminder that, given the right circumstances and support, young people from their background can achieve remarkable success.

Silver Arts Award

Steven, Den, Lisa and Jenny will be presented with their Silver Arts Awards on Thursday next week at The Platform in Swindon. Steven's story appears on the Arts Award website at:

http://www.artsaward.org.uk/site/?id=2156&action=preview&backTo=index

Early Intervention: The Next Steps

Graham Allen's review was published this week. It can be found at:

http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/early-intervention-next-steps.pdf

We made our own contribution to it and it was good to see the following sentence on page 48

"Health and early years services need to do more to ensure that expectant mothers and fathers are offered high-quality community-based preparation for parenthood that includes learning about the needs of babies during pregnancy and early life and how to make the successful transition to parenthood."

At last there is recognition that expectant fathers, as well as expectant mothers, should be offered some means of preparation for fatherhood. Perhaps our new course can become part of that provision. But the fact that the word 'father' appeared nearly EIGHT times less frequently than the word 'mother' suggests that policy makers still have some way to go.

A big day for dads

It's all happening today. An article appeared in The Times this morning. Entitled "The reality of being a teenage dad" by Elizabeth McFarlane, it has an almost accurate quote of mine. You can find the article at http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/life/relationships/article2875431.ece but to read it you'll have to subscribe for £1, then unsubscribe!

Then this evening Panorama broadcast its programme, "Where's Dad?", about fathers who lose contact with their children.

And finally I've just finished writing the Tutor Pack to go along with Dads Matter Too, the rewrite of our original dads' course. All we have to do now is to get it checked by our friends at the National Open College Network to see that it's at the right standard for Level 1 accreditation. When that's done we'll see if we can get it published. Jackie has agreed to produce an A4 copy of the DVD cover to use as the front cover for the course. Thanks Jackie!

Dads Matter Too

At last. I've finished the course rewrite. I'll be taking it round to check out what people think about it. If any of you read this, put it out on Facebook cos I know more of you use that than the blog. Ta!

Independent Review on Poverty and Life Chances

Some time ago we were asked to make a submission to Frank Field's Review, which has just been published, and can be found at this link:

http://povertyreview.independent.gov.uk/media/20254/poverty-report.pdf

U-Too was one of 31 CSJ Alliance members who contributed to the Review. Page 86 of the Review says that, "Submissions from the CSJ Alliance emphasised the role of the family relationships as being the key determinants of positive outcomes. Structure and stability of the family, emotional stability of the parents, parenting skills, quality of adult and child relationships, inter-adult relationships and positive adult role models were all identified as crucial factors. Love and affection in a committed family setting was by far the single aspect of early childhood most often cited as having the greatest influence."

All of us involved with U-Too; dads, mums and tutors; know how true this all is. Let's hope the Government decides to take the Review's recommendations seriously and supports the sort of work which we and so many other social enterprises and charities know is fundamental to improving the life chances of so many children.

Dad Academy focus group

Fifteen of us met at the Methodist International Centre on Thursday. Most came from London but we weren't the only provincials. Nor was Den the only young dad. The meeting started with a general discussion about what it means to be a dad and went on to identify great ideas for groups of local fathers to do with their children. Den talked about his experience of Story Sacks in Swindon and it was humbling to hear about the wide range of other really creative projects that were going on elsewhere in the UK. Of particular interest to us was the baby massage programme in Lewisham where dads are being trained to run sessions for other dads, the comprehensive Dangerous Dads activities programme which has been developed in Devon, and the use of film animation in Birmingham. There's so much good stuff going on.

The Fatherhood Institute

We've been asked to take part in a Fatherhood Institute meeting in London on Thursday. Den and I will be going and we'll report what happens.