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Mother and daughter talking with a counselor

Supporting children and caregivers through family resource centers

Family resource centers are community-based places where families can access support services and information, such as parenting classes, job training, mental health and family counseling, child care, job training and more.

Family resource centers can be found in a variety of settings including schools, hospitals, churches, community centers and other organizations.

With programs and activities generally provided at no cost or low cost to participating families, they are responsive to the specific needs, cultures, and interests of the local populations they serve.

Daughter smiling at mom with a counselor

Networking resource centers across South Carolina

Children’s Trust convenes the S.C. Family Support Network for its members that serve families across South Carolina. The network works to build the capacity of family serving organizations by promoting best practices, standards of quality, capacity building, peer learning and programming initiatives.

The network welcomes organizations who offer a variety of services and supports for families in their local communities, encouraging its members to leverage relationships to access resources, foster peer learning and collectively strengthen community systems and processes. The network promotes national standards of quality and is a member of the National Family Support Network.

The goal of the network is that every caregiver, parent and child have access to quality family support services. It is guided by principles of community, family-centeredness, interconnection and belonging.

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Building quality through national standards

The S.C. Family Support Network uses the national standards to demonstrate and measure how to work with families in a family-centered, strengths-based, multi-generational approach. Their aim is to build protective factors that increase family stability, enhance child development and reduce child abuse and neglect. They also focus on diversity, equity and inclusion and address community conditions that impact families. The Standards have created a common language for quality practice across many different kinds of programs that work with families such as family resource centers, home visiting programs, and child development programs.

There are 15 standards centered on five areas of practice, each with a set of indicators and implementation examples.