The Family & Public Life Initiative
Understand the family.
Shape the future.
family literacy (re)defined
Our goal
Responding to challenges facing the next generation
Research about the family is extensive. Yet individual and public understanding is not.
Illiteracy about the value of marriage, children, and family life carries real costs.
This new family literacy framework and method bridges the research-to-competence gap.
It translates interdisciplinary family research into accessible critical skills and core competencies.
Our initiatives chart a hopeful path forward by equipping the next generation with the knowledge and skills to understand why healthy marriages and strong families benefit their lives.
It equips them to thoughtfully communicate why the family is worthy of support, strengthening, and protection in communities and across the world.
Video: family and public life overview
Family and Public Life
By strengthening appreciation for family life and building family literacy skills, these initiatives prepare younger generations to become informed, resilient, and engaged citizens who can use this knowledge to meet the challenges of a rapidly changing world.
What is Family Literacy?
Although family literacy has usually meant education within the family, we expand it to include education about the family.
Video: Family Literacy (re)defined
An innovative literacy-based framework for the next generation.
Adapted from Harvard Divinity School’s Religion and Public Life initiative, our work employs a literacy-based model and educational strategy that translates family research into practical critical skills and core competencies.
It’s designed to equip younger generations to thoughtfully apply this knowledge to complex challenges in a rapidly changing world.
The Problem
Many of our young people lack the clear, practical tools and skills they need to understand, discern, and confidently articulate why marriage, children, and families matter so deeply in both personal and public life. Responding to this pressing need is not only timely but necessary in an era where public discourse around marriage, children, and family is often ambiguous, fragmented, politicized, and oversimplified.
The Gap
Decades of research affirm the family as the most important unit of society. What has been missing is a clear framework for building family literacy: the skills to understand, discern, and articulate why families matter in both individual life and public life.
Responding to the Challenge
It’s difficult to transmit family scholarship and communicate its insights to younger generations in clear, accessible ways. Current approaches often fall short of preparing students to engage effectively with family-related issues in public life. We seek to change this.
Explore Family Literacy Resources
Family Literacy and Education
These educational opportunities and resources are designed to help individuals of all ages learn how to recognize, discern, understand, and analyze family influences in the world around them.
family literacy in education
family literacy in the Professions
Family Literacy and the Professions
This initative will collaborate with professionals in public, private, and nonprofit sectors who share a commitment to the family and who wish to explore how a deeper understanding of the complex influences of families in human affairs can enhance their own work.
We will offer resources, training, and support to professionals working in target areas of education, government/ministries of family, humanitarian affairs, media and communication, storytelling, non-profits, public policy, advocacy, and law.
By strengthening appreciation for family life and building family literacy skills, these initiatives prepare younger generations to become informed, resilient, and engaged citizens who can use this knowledge to meet the challenges of a rapidly changing world.