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HRET Health Research & Educational Trust of New Jersey
ResearchCompleted Projects
Parenting Education
Parenting Education and Child Abuse Prevention Program
Table of Contents:
Project Overview
To address the problem of child abuse in New Jersey, HRET, in collaboration with Parents Anonymous of New Jersey and Prevent Child Abuse–New Jersey, developed a comprehensive parenting education and outreach program in 1999 to improve parenting skills of soon-to-be new parents and caretakers, reduce the incidence of child abuse and neglect and increase the utilization of existing support services. This illustrated, 32-page easy-to-read and parent-friendly resource guide, titled Now What Do I Do? A Guide for Happy & Healthy Children, Parents & Caregivers, was published in spring 2000. Currently, the New Jersey Department of Human Services is in charge of routine updating and distribution of this guide.
The guide (available in both English and Spanish) includes:
- Helpful tips for parents and caregivers of infants, toddlers and preschoolers on how to care for babies;
- Important information on child development and situations such as a baby crying constantly, a colicky baby and feeding a baby, discussing best ways to handle these situations;
- Descriptions of problematic responses to child development and difficult behaviors;
- Descriptions of alternative methods of discipline; and,
- Information on safety issues and protection measures, such as preventing SIDS, not shaking babies, not putting babies face down to sleep and not leaving children in a car unattended.
The purpose of this guide is to prevent families from developing habits that could threaten the health and safety of their children. The guide also emphasizes how to get immediate help by calling any of the listed statewide and county support groups or service agencies.
A total of 150,000 copies of the guide (120,000 in English and 30,000 in Spanish) were distributed by HRET to all New Jersey hospitals to provide to the parents of all newborn babies. It was also distributed to parents, grandparents and caregivers of toddlers and preschoolers through organizations involved in the care of children or having contact with them, such as birthing centers, primary care clinics, WIC sites, Maternal and Child Health Consortia, educational sites, and other state/county and community service agencies.
Production of this guide helped fill the legislative mandate signed by Governor Whitman in December 1998 (S-972), requiring the New Jersey Department of Human Services, in collaboration with the Department of Health and Senior Services, to prepare a pamphlet on signs of child abuse and neglect, services provided by the state that help in preventing child abuse and neglect and the legal ramifications of abusing or neglecting a child. This law also required distribution of the guide to each parent present during the infant’s birth at the time of the mother’s discharge from a hospital or birthing facility. Hence, since 2002, the Department of Human Services has been revising, producing and distributing this resource guide.
Implementation of this project was supported by grants from the Healthcare Foundation of New Jersey, Do Right Foundation, New Jersey Task Force on Child Abuse and Neglect (Department of Human Services), New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services and New Jersey Hospital Association.
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Publications
For more information please call 609-275-4145.
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Related Links
New Jersey Department of Human Services - Child Abuse Prevention
Prevent Child Abuse–New Jersey
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