One of the Most Successful Parent Support Programs Ever Created...with the Police and Parents Working Side by Side.

This program is an example of how the police are crucial to safe communities and families. It ran for 10 years.

Introduction: What Is Parent Watch?

Mission Statement

Parent Watch? is a support and information forum where parents and helping professionals can meet in a positive, skill development/problem solving process that will create "lived" solutions for family conflicts. Through this process of empowerment, Parent Watch can provide parents with a persistent feeling of confidence in dealing with their children and the difficulties that can occur in adolescence.

Rationale for Parent Watch

The teen years can be a time of stress for teens, their families and friends, and the community at large. As they enter adolescence, our children are inundated with new pressures and new decisions. Many are confused by peer pressure, the demands of school, careers, the future—even advertising—at a time when they are least likely to turn to adults for answers. Drugs and alcohol continue to be a provocative and debilitating element and are now considered to be a "normal" part of the adolescent experience. Adolescents may feel a lack of hope and opportunity that can influence their ability to delay gratification, plan their lives and sustain their progress toward adulthood. Lack of government involvement has left dangerous gaps in treatment and support services for adolescents and their families, thereby exacerbating the problem while further diminishing hope.

The prevalence of problems among teens may be as much an indication of their parents just not knowing what to do rather than a sign that the world is falling apart or that we are all at the hands of ‘drug-crazed, adolescent psychopaths’. Many parents don't know how to respond effectively to their teenagers. In their determination to be caring parents they may doubt the value of their experience.

Parent Watch provides an effective, systematic and economical community-based program that assists families in overcoming conflict. The greatest reason for Parent Watch is to remind parents that they are the adults and that they already have the skills to protect themselves, their children and their homes.

Parents are often amazed at the information networks their children have developed, networks that allow kids to provide each other with support, information, places to sleep, news about possible confrontations with other kids or authorities, and more. Parent Watch assists parents in creating their own information networks to allow them to provide each other with support strategies, coping skills and understanding. In Parent Watch, parents reach out to each other with problems and solutions in a supportive setting with professional guidance. Once parents learn how to identify and cope with crises and unacceptable behaviours they can begin to regain control of their homes and their lives.

Evolution: How Parent Watch Started

Parent Watch was created in 1993 by Ray Pidzamecky, then a high school social worker in Oakville, Ontario. While responding to a call from a frantic teen, Pidzamecky enlisted the help of police officer Mike Michalski, of Halton Regional Police Services, to help the boy get out of a gang he’d been a member of. Once they had done this, Pidzamecky and Michalski spent time with the boy to talk things over and to discuss possible sources of help. For Pidzamecky this incident crystallized the importance of parents and professionals working together to help solve the problems affecting teens and families. Pidzamecky realized that parents needed to be made aware of the issues affecting teens. More importantly, they needed help in learning new ways to respond to the crises that affected their families. The impetus for the Parent Watch formula came from Pidzamecky's concern for the adolescents and parents with whom he worked, his understanding of the power of a group process, the need for on-going support for parents, and his personal commitment to using the expertise of people on the front lines such as police, social workers and other parents to solve problems.

The first Parent Watch meeting was held in May 1993 in Oakville, Ontario, when Pidzamecky and several interested parents met with Officer Michalski in a casual setting. The parents at that first meeting found they had common questions and problems, but to make changes in their lives, they needed accurate information as well as support. The social worker and police officer available at each Parent Watch meeting could provide the information parents needed to develop plans and help put them into place.

In 1996, Ray invited Penny Smith, also a high school social worker, to co-lead the ever-growing number of Parent Watch groups, and to help formalize and develop the Parent Watch program.

Since that first meeting in 1993, Parent Watch has emerged as a creative and effective grass roots organiza-tion. Its members have initiated several community forums, establishing recommendations and participating in carrying them out. Parent Watch has become a de facto standard in parent support groups. But it’s essential to remember that the greatest contributors to the success of Parent Watch have been the parents who attended regularly, who courageously told their stories and who made fundamental changes in their lives and the lives of their children.

How does Parent Watch work?

The first step in problem solving is identifying the problem. In a complex system like a family this requires shutting down the noise, confusion and guilt without shutting out support and information. Adolescents can suffer multiple problems ranging from poor attendance at school or failing grades to drug use, even criminal charges. Teens can lapse into depression or appear out of control. Teens in trouble or out-of-control embarrass and frustrate parents who, in turn, become isolated in their frustration. The balance of power shifts away from the adults and onto the adolescent. Parents often feel they have nowhere to turn and may feel rebuffed by other parents who don’t have—or deny having—similar problems. Parents can find themselves and their children in crisis with long waits for counselling or too distrustful to submit to a process they feel will judge their parenting skills and their children.

Parent Watch helps parents regain control by providing a structured, non-judgmental forum where they can depend on and use the back-up and support of other parents. The Parent Watch facilitators—a social worker and a police officer—attend and lead every meeting to help parents learn how and when to use community agencies to assist them in maintaining control. Parent Watch provides a balance between supportive, well-intentioned parents who have the same or similar problems and the accurate information provided by professionals. Progress can then occur as the balance of power shifts away from the kids and back to the parents.

Perhaps a quote from the media sums up Parent Watch best:

“Most of all, Parent Watch helps turn anonymous suburbia into an old-fashioned village in which adults know kids by name and by sights – and, here’s the rub, the kids know that the adults know them.”

(Burlington Spectator, April 3, 1996)

The Purpose of This Manual

For the parent of a problem teen, this is your workbook. Use it at Parent Watch meetings, if there is one in your area, to work through the material and to record your objectives and goals for your family. Couples can use the manual together or individually. If only one spouse attends Parent Watch, the manual can be used by that parent alone or to engage the other spouse in some of the management issues. It can also be used as a self-study guide, although the Parent Watch format assumes that you will have input from professionals. Between meetings it will serve as a resource so you can review your concerns, ideas, and commitments. The manual will help keep you and your group focussed and on track as you move toward effective family management.

This manual organizes and presents the topics and issues that have consistently surfaced at Parent Watch meetings. The format is intended to serve as a workbook for Parent Watch attendees, but can be used by itself if there is no Parent Watch meeting available.

The Role of Parent Watch Facilitators

Parent Watch group facilitators are there to keep the focus on you, your issues and your work. Their job is to make your learning and information sharing easier and more productive, to encourage you to ask questions, and to discuss issues as a group. They are not there to direct you or advise you, but to offer options and perspective. They will also provide you with access to other professionals, services and sources of information that you request or need. The facilitators' goal is to help you and other parents work toward solutions, and to make sure that you get from Parent Watch what it was created to provide: effective solutions for your family.

Having professional helpers as facilitators ensures that the group progresses effectively for every member. Professional helpers are trained to participate without becoming over-involved with the parents and without focussing on their own situations. They are also trained and skilled at providing effective, practical and legal solutions.

Raymond Pidzamecky M.S.W. RSW