News and Events
NEWS
- New Grant to Prevent Sexual Risk Taking Among Young Adolescents
Jan Miller-Heyl, CSU Extension, and David MacPhee, HDFS, just received a 5-year (2008-2011) $5.15M grant from the Office of Adolescent Pregnancy Programs/DHHS to determine whether a family-based approach to preventing sexual risk taking among young adolescents is more effective that a youth-only program. The DARE to be You Care to Wait program will be provided to 9 pairs of sites in 5 states. Half of the sites will receive a program for 12-14 year olds that emphasizes good communication and decision-making skills (e.g., related to risk taking), problem solving related to peer pressure, knowledge of the benefits of abstaining from sex until marriage, and factors in healthy intimate relationships. The other sites will receive an intervention that also includes a family component emphasizing effective parenting of adolescents (e.g., monitoring, limit setting, support, self-efficacy), open communication, and normative adolescent development including sexuality. It is expected that as a result of improved family functioning, teens in the family-based intervention will have more favorable attitudes toward abstinence and lower levels of sexual risk taking 24 months after entry into the program.
Welcome Dr. Lunkenheimer
The Department of Human Development and Family Studies is very pleased to welcome
Dr. Erika Lunkenheimer, Assistant Professor of HDFS, who joins our faculty this fall. Dr. Lunkenheimer completed her doctorate in developmental psychology at the University of Michigan. Her dissertation research examined parent-child co-regulation of affect in early childhood and pathways to children’s externalizing behavior problems. Following her PhD work, Dr. Lunkenheimer was a postdoctoral fellow at the Child and Family Center at the University of Oregon. She brings tremendous strength and expertise to HDFS in areas such as early prevention and health promotion, developmental psychopathology, parent-child interaction, and dynamic systems methodology. To learn more about Dr. Lunkenheimer’s interests and expertise, please visit the Faculty Research Interests section of our website.
- New Grant to Promote Health Literacy in Head Start Families
Lise Youngblade and Karen Barrett received a 3-year (2008-2011), $1.2M grant from the federal Administration for Children and Families to test an intervention to promote health care literacy in Head Start families. Children eligible for Head Start services are at risk for non-optimal use of the health care system; however, great opportunity exists to minimize the impact of these risks by intervening early. Toward this end, Project HOME (Healthcare Options Made Easy) will address two overarching goals. The first goal is to refine, implement, evaluate, and sustain a family-empowering, culturally sensitive, replicable train-the-trainers curriculum for improving Head Start families’ healthcare literacy skills. The second goal of Project HOME is to integrate Head Start systems with current significant state-level momentum under the Colorado Medical Home Initiative (CMHI) toward the goal of developing an integrated pediatric health care system that encompasses the “whole child” and bridges services across the various health, mental health, dental, and school-based needs that children have. This grant involves a number of partnerships that include state-level programs at the Colorado Department for Public Health and Environment and the state Head-Start Collaboration Office. Across the state, Project HOME will be tested in Head Start programs in Weld County, Denver, and Ignacio. The project includes CSU colleagues in Human Development and Family Studies, the School of Social Work, Extension, Food Science and Human Nutrition, and Black Student Services.
The Third Time’s a Charm! The ECC Children Take a Trip to the Magical Trains
In what appears to be headed toward an annual fall event, children in the Early Childhood Center (ECC) visited a magical train garden at the home of Prue Kaley, an HDFS alumna, and Mark Goldrich, her husband. After rain postponed the trip twice, the third date proved perfect. On a gorgeous sunny day in September, 78 children, teachers, and parent chaperones descended on Prue and Mark’s garden for a morning full of excitement and awe. Children spent hours looking at a wonderland full of miniature houses, people, and varied scenes all connected by model trains. Squeals of laughter greeted “Thomas the Tank Engine” as he rounded the bend – several of the children remembering that he had been there the year before and eagerly awaited the visit to see him again. Children participated in a scavenger hunt to find lots of hidden treasures in the train garden. After a lovely picnic lunch of pizza and lemonade, some very happy and tired children climbed back aboard the CSU bus to head back to the Center for some well earned naps! The Department of HDFS is so thankful to Prue and Mark for this wonderful adventure, and for their generosity in not only welcoming our youngest students back to their home a second time, but also for their contagious enthusiasm in saying “Let’s do this every year!”
For more information about the Early Childhood Center, please visit us in 131 Gifford; visit the ECC website, www.hdfs.cahs.colostate.edu/ecc/; or contact the Director, Linda Carlson, by phone, (970) 491-7082.
EVENTS
- Fall 2008
The Center for Family and Couple Therapy presents Relationship Enhancement for Adults and Children (RELATE). This is a monthly program for adults and children on topics important to your family. View the RELATE flyer for more details.