Ask most parent leaders how they got started, and you'll hear the same thing: someone saw something in them before they saw it in themselves. Members of our National Parent Café Leadership Team share what brought them into leadership — and what keeps them coming back.

When BSF CEO Kathryn Leigh Goetz received a breast cancer diagnosis, the principles she'd spent decades teaching families became deeply personal. Here, she reflects on what a serious illness reveals about how we nourish ourselves and why small, loving changes around the kitchen table can be among the most powerful acts of resilience a family can take.

This is for everyone doing the real, messy, beautiful, heavy work of supporting families. BSF's Robyn Harvey writes with honesty as a mother, grandmother, leader, and human, about the weight she carries and why she needs this movement just as much as she helps build it.

When youth in Illinois DCFS care identified equitable hair care as a statewide priority, they didn't just talk about it; they turned it into law. Here's how the Illinois State Youth Advisory Board for youth in care, in partnership with Loyola University Chicago, helped young people transform lived experience into lasting policy change.

Abraham Blue was just a kid running around grabbing snacks while his parents sat in Parent Café circles at Vision for Children at Risk in St. Louis. Twelve years later, he's facilitating youth Cafés of his own. This is how the Café model works across generations.

More than 850 people filled the Robert Crown Community Center for our 3rd Annual Evanston is Family Strong Back to School Family Fun Fest. We gave away 1,000 backpacks, 500 books, and a whole lot of joy. Here's a look at the day that reminded us what community really looks like.

When schools partner with families, students thrive. We're working with school districts across Illinois to bring Parent Cafés into Parent University programs — training parent leaders, building community, and making engagement accessible to every family regardless of language or background.

Parent Cafés are designed to work for every family, and sometimes that means adapting for specific communities. From families navigating medical complexity to LGBTQIA+ parents, military families to Chinese speakers, we've co-created specialized Café curriculum with partners around the world. Here's a look at ten examples.

Guns are now the leading cause of death among children and adolescents in South Carolina. In partnership with the South Carolina Department of Public Health, we've adapted the Parent Café model to address gun safety and nonviolence, taking a two-generation approach.