A LACK OF TRAINED personnel is one of the challenges facing Parents Education for Development in Barbados (PAREDOS).
Director Marcia Graham said help was needed in counselling, information technology and public relations.
“We get a number of people needing counselling, so we need trained people [to assist them]. We [also] need people with technological skills who can help
us with [things such as] PowerPoint presentations and all those fancy
things that we may not necessarily be able to do; to help us with the public relations and to really get into the trenches with us to follow up on those persons who come to us, to follow through after initial counselling,” she said.
Graham told the media Sunday after a church service at Abundant Life Assembly in Bank Hall, St Michael in celebration of Parent Month that funding was also a problem.
“Our counselling services are free and we try to keep it that way because we really want to be able to offer that service to people who cannot pay,” she said.
“A major challenge that we face is getting persons who are already qualified to come and give us some of their time without us having to pay them.
“We are also looking for more [members of] corporate Barbados to say, ‘Here is some funding that you can put into your programmes,’ so that the people who really
can’t pay will be able to access them.”
Graham said PAREDOS employed eight counsellors, one of whom was paid, but the lack of funding and personnel was hampering the organization’s growth. She aims to get 100 volunteers by year’s end.
As for the biggest problems she saw facing parents and children, she said it was mostly a lack of communication and the inability of some people to resolve their differences. There were also issues with respect and being good role models for children, she admitted.
“How can you get your children to obey you? How can you be a good role model for your children? And when things go wrong, how do you resolve it? How do you restore [good relations with] your family?
“Some parents never restore [the relations with] their children; there are parents and children who [have not spoken] to one another for years – andwe want to tackle [those issues],” she said.
Graham said the theme for the month was Be Grateful. She said PAREDOS would be continuing its activities with a panel discussion on childhood emergencies, which is still in the planning stages, and a year-long programme in association with the constituency councils where the agency would go through every parish speaking to parents about How To Discipline Without Hitting. (CA)
