Padres Unidos Completes Sixth Year Serving San Juan Capistrano Community

St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church held its sixth annual graduation ceremony for 66 children and 58 parents who participated in this year’s Padres Unidos program.

 

The Padres Unidos program has been committed to serving low-income Hispanic families in Orange County since 1999, through a variety of child, youth, and family services. Their mission is to foster self-sufficiency and responsibility for education among families, believing that “successful families build successful communities.”

The program at St. Margaret’s consists of three components:

 

(1)    Parents as Teachers/School Readiness, which addresses a lack of access by many low-income Hispanic children to preschool programs that can provide a head start before kindergarten.

(2)    Playing with Mommy, an educational program that helps parents work with children as young as 18 months old to acquire skills that will be beneficial as they grow up.

(3) Parent Support and Education, designed to helping parents strengthen their own skills in both parenting and family dynamics to provide children with a home environment that is conducive to educational success.

 

Padres Unidos and St. Margaret’s began collaborating in 2013 when the Church sponsored a program at the Boys & Girls Club in San Juan Capistrano. Starting in 2015, that program became a joint effort with the Church and the School, and moved to campus where it remains to this day.

 

During the past six years, more than 550 children and parents have participated in St. Margaret’s-sponsored Padres Unidos programs. The success of Padres Unidos has been confirmed by a multi-year longitudinal study undertaken by them in cooperation with the school of education at Chapman University and the Santa Ana Unified School District.