Project LAUNCH / Vision for Children / University of Missouri

Project LAUNCH, a federal SAMSHA Initiative, has been funding local collaborations to improve early childhood outcomes related to social, emotional, behavioral and physical health for at least the past decade. In 2014, Be Strong Families began training teams on Parent Cafes at the St. Louis, MO Project LAUNCH site to meet the parent engagement requirement of the Project LAUNCH model. Over the years, the Cafe effort has expanded and gone statewide. In 2018, BSF began offering training of trainers on Parent Cafés in response to partner requests. When Project LAUNCH funding ended, the partners involved in the initiative pieced together other funding to keep the Café effort strong. In 2019, Be Strong Families began certifying training partners and Missouri was one of the first Certified Training Partner efforts. There are currently 6 Certified Training Partner agencies under the auspices of the University of Missouri that are training local organizations to conduct in-person and on-line Parent Cafés and sharing data with Be Strong Families.