What Unites Our Programs
Category: News
March 22, 2021
Our Focus and Guiding Principles
While we offer many programs that serve a variety of clients and result in a range of program-level outcomes, they come together for one centralized goal. What unites our work is that we develop our clients’ self-sufficiency and self-efficacy. This is what we do as an agency, albeit in different ways, depending on what program a client is in.
Together, self-sufficiency and self-efficacy lead to improved parent-child interactions, school-readiness for children, stronger social, family and community bonds, family resilience, and even improved health.
What is Self-Sufficiency?
Self-sufficiency is the client’s ability to supply for their own and their family’s needs without outside assistance. There are obvious reasons for building self-sufficiency, including reduced health care costs and reduced strain on local governments. In addition, self-sufficient people impact their families and communities in more nuanced ways, too.
- Several studies have demonstrated that a strong sense of personal control is positively predictive of well-being and health in the United States. (Lachman & Weave, 1998)
- Positive feelings based on personal success are highly associated with general happiness among Americans. (Kitayama et al., 2000)
- Self-esteem and an internal locus of control predict resilience.
What is Self-Efficacy?
Self-efficacy relates to the extent to which our clients believe that they can master a specific skill—this relates to self-confidence. Parents’ own beliefs about how good a parent they are has a huge impact on families and influences the quality of care they ultimately provide.
- Parents’ self-efficacy and satisfaction with their parental role has a crucial role in parent-child interactions. (Calvo & Bianco, 2015)
- Parents who feel more competent exhibit a greater confidence in acquiring and exercising effective parenting skills… (Jones & Prinz, 2005)
- Self-esteem is a protective factor in the mother-child relationship (Teti & Gelfand, 1991)
- Parents with a strong sense of self-efficacy can be more at ease and effective in dealing with the everyday difficulties of being a parent, and this positively influences their satisfaction with the role. (Coleman & Karraker, 1997)
How Do We Do this
Our programs develop self-sufficiency and self-efficacy through relationship-building, parent education, and resource management. The goal of the Any Baby Can team is to help parents learn the skills they need to provide the best support for their child, while also growing their confidence in their own abilities as a parent.
We also collaborate with other nonprofits, medical providers and government agencies to direct clients to community resources so they can actively plan for their child’s future.
Over the coming months, we’ll be sharing more details on how these elements come together in our theory of change. Ultimately, we all know that strong parents lead to strong families, and strong families lead to strong communities.
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