Jamaicans urged to Revisit Community Parenting

Member of Parliament for Eastern St. Andrew, Andre Hylton, is calling for the concept of community parenting to be revisited in Jamaica, as an effective means of raising children.

The community, he said, is an important socialising agent that has the ability to shape the lives of its resident youth population.

Mr. Hylton was speaking at a parenting seminar held on Friday (June 22) at the Allman Town Primary School in Kingston.

Approximately 150 parents of the Allman Town, Parade Gardens and Fletchers’ Land communities benefitted from the seminar, which was aimed at improving their ability to more effectively care for their children.

Noting the importance of the workshop, Mr. Hylton said that Jamaicans should strive to be exceptional role models for their children and other young people in the community.

“We have to be positive role models in the care and upbringing of our children…if we become too relaxed, then the wrong persons will initiate our children into manhood and womanhood,” he pointed out.

He also implored all parents to motivate and speak positively to their children, and to desist from placing negative and stereotypical labels on their children.

“Whatever, you want your child to be, you can speak it into being,” Mr. Hylton stated, while encouraging the participants to develop and maintain a vision for their children.

The training was part of a RISE Life Management Services /Citizen Security and Justice Programme (CSJP) collaborative project, operating in several inner-city communities in Kingston, which seeks to empower residents to contribute to the development of their communities.

By Toni-Ann Russell, JIS PRO