Welcome to DAD-U: a Crash Course for New and Returning Dads
We believe that every family and child deserve a Healthy Start! With our DAD-U Program, we acknowledge that involved fathers have a positive impact on both our children and the family dynamics.
Our DAD-U fatherhood program offers education, training, and support to help men become “Dedicated and Devoted” fathers. By providing these services, we truly believe that we are working towards our motto of “As fathers we are not striving towards perfection, but rather striving to be present”.
The DAD-U program is structured as a two-hour group session that concentrates on fatherhood development as well as providing freshman fathers with the basic skills to become productive and impactful members of their families. Skills in which DAD-U focuses one during the scheduled group sessions consist of an infant-fatherhood pathways component, effective techniques for discipling of children, Co-parenting, health/wellness and mental health wellbeing.
Program Components:
After each component, Freshman DADs should feel confident in their ability to perform their responsibilities as fathers. After the initial sessions, Freshman Dads are encouraged to return as Junior or Senior Dads to both share their experiences and mentor less experienced fathers.
Session Format:
Session will be held as a group format with a collection of freshman fathers. Locations can be that of a conference room, church halls, community center or any room that allows for a circle of chairs to be amassed. Sessions will then be facilitated by a Healthy Start Coalition DAD-U Coach and when necessary, co-facilitated by a Junior/Senior Dad. Moreover, sessions will be scheduled for a timeframe of 2 hours whereas all DAD-U components will be covered and an open discussion held afterwards.
DAD-U Completion:
Once matriculated into DAD-U and completion of the 2-hour sessions, the freshman father will be offered the opportunity to advance into the TEAM DAD curriculum for specialized individual sessions. It shall be noted that accepted into the TEAM DAD program is obtained after certain pre-requisites are meet. If the pre-requisites are not meet, the freshman DAD would be encouraged to return to DAD-U as a junior and eventually a senior DAD.
