Our goal with this toolkit is two-fold. First, we hope to increase awareness about the unique challenges that young parents face. Some of these difficulties are listed in the following sections. Often in our society, these young people are pushed out of sight or deemed unequal to the task of parenting; however, our experience (and a whole host of data) shows that with additional strengths-based support, they are quite capable of achieving their personal goals while building happy, healthy, and thriving families.

Second, we’d like to provide strategies and resources for adults who may work with expectant and parenting youth to ensure they’re being supportive, effective, and affirming in their work — whether that’s in the classroom, at home, at a job site, or at a community agency. To this end, we include general principles as well as concrete strategies, like altering your language choices related to young parents and interrupting common myths and stigma about teen parenthood.