STRENGTHENING FAMILIES
New program being launched at Summerside Youth Engagement Centre.
A new program gearing up at the Summerside Youth Engagement Centre aims to help local families find strength in each other.
The strengthening families program has been used in dozens of countries since it was created more than 30 years ago. This will be the first time it has been available on Prince Edward Island.
“To sit down as a family and have a meal and talk to your kids that’s becoming more a lost thing than it used to be. We’re so busy.” Jason (Lefty) Gallant, site co-ordinator for strengthening families program at Summerside Youth Engagement Centre
Jason (Lefty) Gallant is the site co-ordinator for the program and recently undertook the related training with several facilitators from the centre.
The program’s goal is evidential by its name.
It focuses on improving the lines of communication, conflict resolution skills and overall cohesiveness of a family with the ultimate goal being to prevent behaviour in kids and teens, like drug abuse, self-harm and truancy, which can lead to more serious problems later in life.
There is no cookie-cutter family type or situation that would best suit this kind of training, said Gallant.
Any family can find itself facing difficulties communicating.
“These are skills that are sometimes lost with today’s world. To sit down as a family and have a meal and talk to your kids that’s becoming more a lost thing than it used to be. We’re so busy,” he said.
“Help solving some problems – everybody can use that.”
Program sessions will be every Wednesday night for 14 weeks. Gallant is hoping to have between 10 and 14 families in each group.
Each session will start with a free communal meal followed by a counselling session where adults and kids will separate and then another where they will join back together.
Each group of families will also have access to special activity nights where they might go to a Summerside Western Capitals hockey game or go see a movie.
The first sessions start on Oct. 12.
The program was made possible by $1.2 million during four years by Public Safety Canada’s national crime prevention program.
Its goal is to help at least 120 families during the four years.
Anyone who would like more information about the program can contact Gallant 902-3031499.