Parenting Support

Families will require support when faced with problems they are unable to overcome on their own. Ideally support should come from existing networks, such as extended family, religious leaders, and neighbours. Where such support is not available or sufficient, additional family and community services are required. Such services are particularly important for kinship, foster and adoptive caretakers, and child headed households in order to prevent separation and address abuse and exploitation of children. It is also vital for children affected by HIV/AIDS and armed conflict, and those children living on the street.

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Global Parenting Initative,

Parents living through conflict, displacement, and humanitarian crises faced extraordinary pressures that affected both their own wellbeing and their children’s development. This Global Parenting Initiative webinar brought together global and field-level perspectives to explore how parenting and psychosocial support could be better aligned within humanitarian systems.

UNICEF,

In 2025, UNICEF and UNFPA conducted a national review of parenting programmes in Moldova to assess their role in addressing violence against children and women and to inform more effective, gender-transformative interventions. The study provides evidence to support the development of a Theory of Change and evaluation framework for strengthening prevention efforts.

UNICEF,

Această evaluare națională examinează contextul, calitatea și eficacitatea programelor de educație parentală pentru îngrijitori din Republica Moldova dintr-o perspectivă transformatoare de gen, cu un accent deosebit pe contribuția lor la prevenire

IACN Secretariat,

In this webinar, speakers shared the principles, practices, and innovative initiatives in family strengthening across the East and North-Eastern regions of India. Speakers reflected on evolving family vulnerabilities, the role of family-based care in care reform, and what it truly takes to embed family-strengthening principles into everyday practice.

Laloyo Stella Apecu, and Ndaru Zabibu,

This qualitative case study in Arua City, Uganda, explores how parenting practices contribute to the persistence of street children, drawing on interviews with 30 street-connected children as well as parents and community leaders. Findings show that poverty, neglect, abuse, weak supervision, and family breakdown—combined with push factors like hunger and domestic violence and pull factors such as peer networks and perceived economic opportunity—drive children to the streets, underscoring the need for strengthened family support, community protection systems, and parental economic empowerment.

Uniting Vic. Tas,

This evaluation of Uniting Vic.Tas’ Family Preservation and Reunification (FPR) Program in Australia found that intensive, in-home support helps families stay safely together, especially when practitioners build trusting relationships and provide both practical and emotional support. The study also identified opportunities to strengthen the program, including longer engagement periods, greater continuity with practitioners, and follow-up support after families exit the program.

Subroto Chatterjee and Richa Tyagi,

This study addresses the urgent need for family-based care for children without parental care, as emphasised by the UN General Assembly’s 2019 resolution, India’s Juvenile Justice Act 2015, and Mission Vatsalya. The primary aim is to evaluate the effectiveness of the Thrive Scale™ tool developed by Miracle Foundation India in generating measurable, data-driven decisions to plan and implement suitable interventions for family strengthening.

Shari Monsma, Gail Molliet, Barbara Lee, et. al,

This report presents findings from a 2022 consultation with kinship caregivers across British Columbia, highlighting their experiences navigating children and family services. Analysis revealed the need for recognition and respect for kinship families, improved access to consistent and equitable supports, trauma-informed and culturally grounded practices, and stronger collaboration with service providers, with caregivers’ calls for action emphasizing system improvements to sustain caregiving and promote children’s well-being.

UNICEF, Maestral International,

The report analyses existing parenting support policies, programmes and service models relevant to child protection and care reform. Drawing on international evidence and national sources, the review highlights the role of parenting support in preventing family separation, strengthening caregiving capacities and improving child well-being across the life course.

WHO,

Supporting parents and caregivers requires a whole-of-society approach, with coordinated responses from the health, education, social services, private and other sectors. This brief focuses on the role of the health sector specifically. It explains why the health sector should support parents and caregivers, describes the type of support they need, and outlines the key building blocks of the health sector response.