Parent Support Center's Profile

The Parent Support Center is a non-profit educational organization dedicated to strengthening and enriching family and classroom environments serving families and schools in the greater Metro Portland area and Eugene since 1989. The Parent Support Center offers the following services in Partnership with schools and community agencies:

* Low cost parenting classes
* Workshops and classes for educators
* Periodic review and problem solving workshops
* Provides teaching and learning materials

The Parent Support Center started in the fall of 1988 in response to an unmet need for effective, low cost parenting classes. Initially the classes focused on Head Start parents and were taught by PSC founders, JoAnne Nordling, a former teacher and school counselor and Lorraine Heller, a former Head Start Teacher. Classes now serve the greater Metro area and Eugene under the nurturing facilitation of ten trained and experienced parent educators.

The Taking Charge Program is a positive, common-sense approach to classroom and parenting discipline. A unique value of the Taking Charge Program is that the material is written for both educators and parents, resulting in a common vocabulary and approach which strengthens cooperative bonds between parents and teachers. Classes for parents generally meet over a five or six week period. The Taking Charge material and supportive class environment provides parents with the skills and support to respond to children’s misbehaviors with positive and loving discipline while raising feelings of competency in both child and adult.

In addition to the basic parenting material, Taking Charge classes for teachers and child care providers include concrete suggestions for classroom behavior management, skills for conflict resolution, conducting classroom meetings, and building incentive programs for completion of schoolwork assignments. The Parent Support Center seeks to provide teachers with skills in discipline which build student’s self-confidence and teach effective life skills. We hope to provide teachers with tools to make their job and relationships with students more of a pleasure.

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