Mission
The mission of the Parent Coaching Institute is to revitalize parenting in the 21st Century by guiding parents to make better decisions that support their children’s optimal cognitive, emotional/social development.
Through our innovative coaching model we energize, assist, and inspire parents, co-creating with them new levels of family fulfillment and parent empowerment.
We intentionally co-construct effective, evidence-based strategies with the parents we serve so they can positively impact external pressures (such as the impact of media and the high stress of today’s world) that directly affect parental decisions and the home environment. In our increasingly complex society, parents have more challenges than ever. Therefore, family support must shift dramatically to adequately address these profound changes. The PCI leads the new paradigm for supporting families, effectively shifting to a living systems, synergetic model with extraordinarily positive results.
History
I founded the PCI in 2000 with a dream of a new way to support parents based on leading edge change process theories and a unique coaching model. I wanted to create, not only a training program, but also an institute that would be a “container” for like-minded professionals to support one another in their highest potential and most creative expression. I knew of no other organization that gathers together professionals working with families from all around the globe and provides ways for them to interact, meet, work together, and learn from one another. This vision inspired me and energized me!
The training curriculum came first.
Over a three-year period (1999–2002) I constructed a graduate-level, year-long, distance learning program under the auspices of the Department of Education at Seattle Pacific University. Based on a synthesis of what we know works for families, the reception of this curriculum by professionals such as parent educators, therapists, counselors, teachers, and community health workers, was and continues to be extremely positive.
My past 30 years experience and growing awareness of the dire need for effective ways to meet parent’s needs, served me well to create a compelling, comprehensive, and exciting curriculum. I am ever grateful for those experiences and for my drive and passion to provide new tools for families and a coherent framework for professionals who support families.
The Parent Coaching Institute’s training curriculum carefully defines the world today’s parents operate in. It intentionally implements an ecological theoretical model and coaching process that draws forth the authentic, phenomenal self of the parent, positively impacting the children, the family, and eventually, society itself. It is an amazingly energetic and creative process!
In creating the curriculum I asked myself key questions:
- What could be more powerful for a society than parents rearing children who grow into capable, emotionally healthy adults who take their place in the world, eager to contribute to the greater good and having the skills, aptitude, and intrinsic motivation to willingly make a meaningful contribution?
- What could be more powerful for a society than energized mothers and fathers who know what to do and how to be to meet their children’s cognitive, emotional, social, and spiritual needs with ease on a daily basis?
- How would a society look if parents every step of their eighteen-year journey had a professional companion with the expertise to offer on-going relevant information, and with the kind heart to be compassionate, non-judgmental while championing parents’ dreams and childrens’ highest good?
When we parent well, we do change the world. I founded the PCI on the basis of this inspiring idea. Each of us as a parent has a sacred trust to give back to society by making sure our children are not only fit for society but fit to improve society, as well. Each parent is one small part of a much greater whole. Yet, without our small contribution, there is a hole in the whole. With too many such holes, the fabric of our very society tears to shreds as we see in our current state of crisis.
The PCI’s curriculum and training methodologies prepare professionals to coach parents well, catalyzing the process of more energized, creative parenting. From there, the possibilities are endless–for our children and for our future.
The PCI is now the dynamic institute I dreamed about in the year 2000. It supports the highest creative expression of our students and graduates, becoming a well of wisdom and insight, as we work together to support PCI’s Mission.
—Gloria DeGaetano
Founder, The Parent Coaching Institute