Robin Higa - Executive Director of the Community Café Collaborative and founder of the Community Café approach

Partnering with Family Leaders: A Relationship Building Continuum | Robin will address why supporting parent leadership is key to all work with families that values inclusion, equity, and respect. Historical service models were designed and structured to provide a service to a consumer. This model maintains historical power structures which can perpetuate a service provider/service recipient relationship. We need a way to shift power back to families by creating systems that support families to use their full capacity to lead the way. In addition, supporting parent leadership requires strategies along a continuum of relationship building. These strategies need to recognize that relationships are built by challenging mental models and how we work and engage with one another.

Robin Higa has been a parent leader activist, working with diverse family leaders for over 30 years. She is the founder of the Community Café approach and the Executive Director of the Community Café Collaborative. Their work in developing authentic partnerships with families to strengthen families and build supportive communities has been recognized locally and nationally.

Partnering with Family Leaders: A Deeper Dive

• Robin Higa, Executive Director of the Community Café Collaborative and founder of the Community Café approach
• Carolyn Solitaire, Parent Leader
• Take a deeper dive with our keynote speaker and explore strategies that support families to use their full capacity to lead the way.

Parent Advocacy Councils: Stories of Success

• Julie Day, National Trainer Building and Sustaining Effective PACs; Jessica Gifford, Parent Advisory Council Chair at The River Center; Kelli Tourgee, Home Visitor and Parent Educator at The River Center; Alyssa Tandy, Program Manager at the Family Resource Center of Central NH; Shannon Durning, Family Leadership Council Member at the FRC of Central NH; and Shannon McNamara, Program Director at The River Center
• Parents are an under-utilized asset in growing great programs. Join this panel discussion, featuring staff from NH Family Resource Centers and parent leaders, and listen to a few examples of how Parent Advisory Councils moved the work of the program forward by including parent voices and perspectives.

Family Voice Heard Here

• Robin deAlmeida, Project Director of Communications and Family Engagement at the Parent Information Center of NH and Nathan Fink, Director of Advancement at NH Children’s Trust
• This workshop will explore the importance of Family Voice and how it can positively impact service provision for individuals, families, and providers. During the conversation, attendees will wrestle with three foundational questions: What is Family Voice? Why is it important? And how do we build it? Together, Robin and Nathan explore how those questions launched a partnership to better engage families and family-serving agencies in the concept of family voice and its power to influence systems.

Intentionality in Parent Engagement: Using a Logic Model to Backwards Plan for Measurable Outcomes

• Becky Berk, M.Ed., Data Manager at NH Children's Trust
• Parent engagement is a critical element in the work of supporting children and families. What is often missing, however, is a clearly articulated strategy for how this will be accomplished, at what level, with which group(s) of parents, and how such efforts will be measured and reported for success. The development of a logic model specific to parent engagement is an essential process for building a series of intentional, clearly articulated strategies that start with the end in mind. Participants will leave the workshop with a logic model for their program articulating the full scope of at least one strategy for implementation.

Resilience Reins: Fostering Family Connections

• Jillian Purcell, M.Ed., Volunteer at UpReach Therapeutic Equestrian Center and Kristen McGraw, Unmounted Program Manager at UpReach Therapeutic Equestrian Center
• Join this discussion surrounding Resilience Reins, a multi-disciplinary approach for families who have had a variety of life experiences. Parents attend a Parent Café focusing on building protective factors such as resiliency, communication, and connectivity. Simultaneously, their children participate in a psychoeducational curriculum utilizing equines in group activities designed to build resiliency, enhance interpersonal relationships, and foster self-worth.

Persuasive Advocacy for Parents

• Claire Garand, Education Program Manager at Media Power Youth and Heather Inyart, Executive Director of Media Power Youth
• In this workshop, participants will learn the techniques that advocates, artists, and other persuasive leaders use to make a strong argument, and how to apply those techniques to advocating for their needs. To equip a caregiver to engage in a dialogue, they will need to understand how different parties within a system view the situation. Parents will not only learn how to be better advocates but also how to position themselves for great opportunities by aligning their digital presence with their values. By understanding the audience they are speaking to and the persuasive techniques they need to employ, caregivers can become more successful at harnessing opportunities and gaining the services and support they need.

Building Effective Parent/Practitioner Collaboration

• Carolyn Abdullah, Training and Technical Assistance Coordinator of the FRIENDS National Center for CBCAP and Valerie Lebanion, Parent Leader
• Participants will join FRIENDS National Center Training and TA Coordinator and a member of FRIENDS National Parent Advisory Council to receive practical guidance on developing parent/practitioner teams, assessing program readiness to engage in parent/practitioner collaboration while also exploring the roles and benefits of parent leaders in programs and community activities. This learning opportunity will help participants build capacity in developing parent/practitioner teams and provide strategies to effectively engage parent leaders in-person as well as virtually.

The Power of Relationships: A Key Player in Ensuring Meaningful Parent Partnership

• Nancy Glynn, Parent Activist and Campaign Associate at MomsRising and Christina D’Allesandro, Senior Campaign Director, NH Director of MomsRising Together & MomsRising Education Fund
• Parents and caregivers are key voices in establishing policies that will truly make a difference for children and families in NH. However, with the high demands placed on those caregivers, it is often difficult for them to participate. Frustration has often been reported from parents and caregivers that their experiences with organizations have been transactional or that they were “checking a box.” So how do we keep parents at the forefront of decision-making? Relationships! Join MomsRising members (REAL parents and caregivers) in a panel discussion on how relational experiences with organizations make a difference in participation on important policy changes impacting families.

Searching for Unicorns

• Matt Buteau, Reunification & Recovery Director at The Family Resource Center; Ashlie Micucci, Parent Leader and Employee of The Family Resource Center; and Amanda Lampron, Certified Recovery Support Worker at The Family Resource Center
• For years, we’ve talked about “family engagement” in social services. It’s time to move on and really explore genuine, meaningful, fully integrated family engagement. Is that possible? Please learn from our quest (and missteps) as we describe how we introduced Parent Partners to our Program Staff.

Engaging Parent Voice Through Parent Cafés

• Deanna LaFrazia, Center Manager of Greater Franklin Area Family Resource Center; Yolanda DaRocha, Parent Leader and Certified Recovery Support Worker at Greater Tilton Area Family Resource Center; Michelle Lennon, Executive Director of Greater Tilton Area Family Resource Center; Danielle Perrino, Greater Tilton Area Family Resource Center; and Kimberly Fortin, Greater Tilton Area Family Resource Center
• This hands-on workshop will discuss parent engagement through the facilitation of Parent Cafés. Parent Cafés are a vital way to connect to parents in our community and an invaluable way to encourage their engagement in additional family support services, which can then better inform or influence programs, policies, and power structures. Following this brief introduction on how Parent Cafes facilitate parent engagement and parent leadership, we will be hosting an abbreviated Parent Café as a way to demonstrate its powerful impact!

Experience Based Co-Design

• Tanya Lord, Ph.D., Director of Patient and Family Engagement at the Foundation for Healthy Communities
• Successful innovation and improvement require that all stakeholders be invited to bring their lived experience to the design, implementation and evaluation of programs and processes. Experience Based Co-Design (EBCD) is a method that includes all those with lived experience to identify problems and then co-design solutions that meet both the needs of the organization and the community being served. The Foundation for Healthy Communities, in New Hampshire, uses EBCD in a variety of ways including in a project to improve the care of individuals with substance use disorder. EBCD allowed for the inclusion of individuals at all stages of recovery including those who are currently using. This session will explore the EBCD model, the Human Centered Design strategies it uses and how to adapt it to different organizations and populations of people.