Families and Schools Together Building Relationships

Both affluent and low-income families struggle with the same issues concerning how to raise a child successfully. Many parents feel alone, too busy to connect with their children, and lacking in support from other adults. Using parent-professional collaborative teams, the Families and Schools Together (FAST) program systematically reaches out to entire families and organizes multifamily groups to increase parent involvement with at-risk youth. Developed in 1987 by Dr. Lynn McDonald of Family Service, a nonprofit family counseling agency in Madison, WI, FAST helps at-risk youth (ages 3 to 14) build relationships through a research- and family therapy-based, multifamily group approach to preventing juvenile delinquency (McDonald, 1993, 1997; 1998; McDonald and Billingham, 1998; McDonald et al., 1991). FAST has been especially successful at involving low-income, stressed, and isolated parents. For several years, the founder of FAST conducted court-ordered, in-home, family therapy with drug- and alcohol-involved and violent youth who had been significantly involved in the court system. She applied family therapy techniques for delinquents that were developed, researched, and published by James Alexander, Ph.D. (1973; Alexander and Parsons, 1973, 1982) and Salvador Minuchin, M.D. (1979). Using these approaches, 75 percent of delinquent youth could alter their circumstances in 3 months of two to three family sessions per week, with 24-hour backup coverage (McDonald, 1993). This therapeutic work developed into the FAST program for early intervention. The FAST program works with school teachers to identify elementary school children about whom they have developmental or behavioral concerns.