BSF doesn't just prevent crises; we help people navigate them. In this edition of "Why Are Cafés So Great?", our CEO reframes the conversation around crisis intervention, asking: what if the real agents of change aren't the professionals, but the community itself?

In a collaboration spanning the better part of three years, Be Strong Families has proudly partnered with the Early Childhood Innovation Network (ECIN) in Washington, D.C. as they explore the outcomes and positive impact of Parent Café participation on parents, caregivers, and their families. This groundbreaking research effort, with the support of BSF, has recently culminated in a significant milestone…

Since 2007, Parent Cafés have reached thousands of families through deep, personal conversations designed to facilitate transformation and healing. Here's what three years of national evaluation data — across 96 partner programs and nearly 14,000 participants — tell us about the impact.

Since Be Strong Families (BSF) first pioneered the Parent Café approach in 2007, hundreds of programs In the US and internationally have adopted the approach, reaching thousands of parents and families through deep, personal conversations designed to facilitate transformation and healing. In 2019 we started the National Parent Café Evaluation Project to be able to share the impact of Parent Cafés. Fifty-five percent of our partners participated in the National Parent Café Project. The following are key trends in data collected in 2019, 2020, and 2021.

In 2019, BSF trained 1,500 people across 25 states, collected feedback from nearly 2,500 Café participants, and welcomed new Certified Training Partners. A look back at a landmark year for the Parent Café movement.

United Planning Organization (UPO), based in Washington D.C., are dedicated to being change agents by offering services in early education, youth, community wellness, and more to the community that surrounds them. UPO shares what happened when they brought Parent Cafés to their community — including 98% of participants saying they'd recommend it to a friend and an Early Intervention Program that liked it so much they adopted the model.

Everyone is recovering from something. That insight is at the heart of BSF's new Recovering Together Cafés — a peer-to-peer conversation model co-created with recovery organizations to meet people where they are and affirm that healing is possible regardless of where someone is on their journey.

Be Strong Families has been hosting Parent Cafés and teaching others how to host them since we began in 2012. Our original Parent Café deck of questions was bilingual, in Spanish and English. As we've evolved, we've worked with communities to translate Be Strong Families Parent Cafés into other languages and to develop Parent Café decks specific to cultural needs.

Three generations, two new babies, and a decade of camping trips Up North. Around a campfire with her daughters-in-law, Robyn Harvey realized the Parent Café agreements had quietly become part of how she shows up for her family. No formal Café required.