The nation's oldest and most respected child welfare organization, The Child Welfare League of America, has selected CICC's trio of parenting skill-building programs as being worthy of special recognition because of the research that confirms their effectiveness.

The League's careful review of the many studies on CICC's Confident Parenting, Effective Black Parenting, and Los Niņos Bien Educados programs showed that the majority of parents who completed classes and seminars in these programs became (a) more positive and effective in raising their children, (b) significantly reduced the use of harsh disciplinary practices, and (c) experienced less stress and more harmony at home. As a result, their children were better adjusted at home and in the community, and they achieved better at school.

The League's review also drew attention to the unique benefits of the latter two programs for parents of African-American and Latino-American children. It highlighted those programs' proven ability to honor and reinforce the importance of cultural pride in raising children.

These and other evidence-based programs will be featured at a workshop at the League's national conference in Washington, D.C., March 9-11, 2005 at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel. The conference theme is Children 2005: Crossing the Cultural Divide.

The workshop is entitled, Evidence-Based Parent Programs: Implications for the Field, and will take place Wednesday, March 9th from 3:30 to 5:00 p.m.. The workshop will be the led by Bruce Hershfield, the Director of the League's Child, Youth and Family Development Division. Dr. Kerby T. Alvy, CICC's founder and Executive Director, will participate in the workshop and discuss why the CICC programs have been so well received in communities nationwide.

2004 marked the 30th anniversary of CICC's efforts to put children first by helping their parents and communities to raise them as effectively and peacefully as possible. This banner year included:

• The completion of a three-year project that brought parenting education classes, seminars, guidebooks, videos and CDs to over 20,000 parents through the early childhood education and care system in Los Angeles County. A book on this model project and its excellent results was written.

• The completion of another three-year project on the identification, assessment and treatment of young children with special needs. This project produced pioneering community services and continuing education like The CICC Discovery Tool and Referral System, the CICC course on the Developmental Assessment of Children Birth to Five, and training conferences on Working Together to Help Young Children with Special Needs. A book on the CICC Discovery Tool was published, as were two research reports on the successful testing of the Tool.

• The completion of Parenting Instructor Training Workshops in Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, Bakersfield, El Monte, Chicago, Baton Rouge, New Orleans, Jacksonville and Baltimore where over 100 new instructors were prepared to deliver parenting services in their communities. These counselors, educators, social workers and psychologists, along with the 6,000 other professionals who CICC has trained through prior workshops, delivered parenting classes and seminars for hundreds of thousands of parents nationwide.

• The enhancement of the usefulness of the CICC website by the addition of several high quality parenting programs to its Parenting Skill-Building Programs section. Visitors now learn about how they can bring CICC's Confident Parenting, Effective Black Parenting and Los Niņos Bien Educados programs to their community, as well as how to also bring the full spectrum of Active Parenting, Nurturing, and Systematic Training for Effective Parenting (STEP) programs to their neighborhoods.

• The usefulness of the CICC website was also enriched by adding and making available more parenting and child development books, videos and CDs on its online bookstore (see Table of Contents).

• The National Partnership Campaign to Find and Help Young Children with Special Needs was launched late in 2004. Campaign presentations were made by CICC's founder and executive director, Dr. Alvy, at meetings the Children's Defense Fund and the National Education Association in Washington, D.C., and at conferences of the National Association for the Education of Young Children and the Florida Coalition for Children. Individuals and groups nationwide began signing up to become Campaign Partners in this critically important new undertaking, including the four new Encourager Partners pictured below with Dr. Alvy.
  
• New members joined the CICC volunteer Board of Directors, including Professor Ronald Fischbach of the Health Sciences Department of California State University at Northridge, and attorney and child advocate, Diedre Wachbrit.

• The free online Effective Parenting Newsletter became available toward the end of 2004, and it already has over 10,000 readers!

Please help further CICC's mission of Strengthening the American Family through parent education and training. A wide range of funding sources is used to keep the Center operating and expanding.

The most important funds that CICC receives are from the thousands of individuals who have made tax- deductible contributions. These important funds are used by CICC to provide free parenting services for needy families, to support the organization's advocacy efforts, and to support the Center during emergencies.