Prevention Enhancement in Fatherhood Programs

Responsible Fatherhood Spotlight: Fathers and Alcohol Abuse

Responsible Fatherhood Spotlight: Teen Fatherhood

Responsible Fatherhood Spotlight: Fathers and Substance Use

Fathers who abuse drugs not only hurt themselves but they hurt the closest people in their lives. While illicit substance use rates for men have declined since the 1970s, these rates remain higher for men than for women. This drug use is more common among young, less educated unmarried men in minority groups than among other fathers.

Five Tips for Fatherhood Programs | National Responsible Fatherhood Professionals

Effective implementation of fatherhood programs requires staff who are knowledgeable about the program and its participants.i Training can provide program staff with the knowledge to become competent in program content, sensitive to participants’ cultural backgrounds, and aware of fathers’ instructional preferences. This brief provides five tips for training fatherhood program staff successfully. 

Dangerous Masculinity: Fatherhood, Race, and Security Inside America's Prisons (Critical Issues in Crime and Society) by Anna Curtis

For incarcerated fathers, prison rather than work mediates access to their families. Prison rules and staff regulate phone privileges, access to writing materials, and visits. Perhaps even more important are the ways in which the penal system shapes men’s gender performances. Incarcerated men must negotiate how they will enact violence and aggression, both in terms of the expectations placed upon inmates by the prison system and in terms of their own responses to these expectations. Additionally, the relationships between incarcerated men and the mothers of their children change, particularly since women now serve as “gatekeepers” who control when and how they contact their children. This book considers how those within the prison system negotiate their expectations about “real” men and “good” fathers, how prisoners negotiate their relationships with those outside of prison, and in what ways this negotiation reflects their understanding of masculinity.

The present study aimed to assess the uniqueness of released prisoners’ paternal practice – their involvement in child rearing, as well as their affection toward and acceptance of their children – and its predictors by comparing them to control fathers who have never been arrested or imprisoned.

Best Practice Guide for Engaging Fathers: A Toolkit for Children Services Staff

This Best Practice Guide contains suggestions for ways agencies can include fathers earlier and more effectively in each case, to ensure the best outcome for children. We know that agencies have different levels of paternal engagement, and that changing agency culture and practice takes time and effort. This guide is designed to meet agencies where they are in that process.

The Father Engagement Strategies will help program staff think about how to ensure fathers feel respected as equal contributors in child-rearing and in early childhood programs. It provides information that can be applied quickly to enhance father engagement.

Parental Substance Use: A Primer for Child Welfare Professionals | Children’s Bureau, An Office of the Administration for Children & Families

This factsheet reviews what substance use disorders (SUDs) are, how parental substance use affects families, and how child welfare professionals can support these families. It also considers how collaboration between child welfare professionals and SUD treatment providers, as well as others, is an essential component to assisting families.

Understanding the Needs of Children of Parents with Substance Use of Co-Occurring Disorders - Child Welfare Training Toolkit 

From the National Center on Substance Abuse and Child Welfare, a program of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration and the Administration for Children and Families, Children’s Bureau

Tip Card for Fatherhood Practitioners: Group Facilitation

By the National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse

Tip Card for Fatherhood Practitioners: Building Effective Partnerships

From the National Fatherhood Initiative

Tip Card for Fatherhood Practitioners: Program Attendance & Retention

By the National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse

Engaging Fathers for Successful Reentry: Research, Tips, and Best Practices

From the National Fatherhood Initiative

Tips for Young Dads | National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse (NRFC)

From NRFC

National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse (NRFC) Join a Virtual Collaborative Community (VCC)

From the National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse (NRFC)

Fatherhood Resources, Links, and Organizations

From Parents as Teachers and the National Responsible Fatherhood Clearinghouse