By Guest Author, 5/5/20, positiveexperience.org/blog
Today’s post is based on an interview with Corey Best, a member of the HOPE National Advisory Board and the Birth Parent National Network (BPNN) | CTF Alliance, which “promotes and champions birth parents as leaders and strategic partners in prevention and child welfare systems reform.”
Can you introduce yourself and your work?
My name is Corey Best, and I’m a family engagement consultant and speaker by title. I stand for justice in the child welfare system, on behalf of systems and parents.
There is a huge gap between authentic relationships and pre-crisis supports and effective interventions for families. I want to play a major role in advocating for non-discriminatory, healthy relationships between parents, systems leaders, and the workforce. We [parents] all have various strengths, and those aren’t often recognized in our child welfare programs, in how we deliver services, and also how we engage with individuals.
Can you talk about how you got interested in HOPE and how that fits in with your work?
I fundamentally believe that HOPE is a causative energy. In our systems, education, healthcare, criminal justice, when we believe that the outcome isn’t possible, HOPE doesn’t exist. When I consider HOPE a causative energy, it means that as I’m building a relationship with another individual, I believe the [healthy] outcome is possible. A parent feels [it] when someone believes in them. That’s what attracts me to HOPE—it’s demanding us to see the souls of people. It’s requiring us to look above and beyond trauma. When we become indoctrinated in systems thinking, focused on the technical solutions, we lose sight of what people truly need to have positive experiences.
You are also a parent. Can you speak about parenting with a HOPE perspective?
When I think about HOPE from a parenting perspective, I begin with observing my child’s social emotional development. I feel that starts with relationships. I’m a single father, and when I think about HOPE, I also think about the systems that my son interacts with, whether those are: after school programs, teachers, and the adults or developmental assets in his life. HOPE from a parenting perspective is recognizing his ability to grow, to learn, to continue to have a growth mindset, [and that] his current situation isn’t fixed, that as long as we try, through positive experiences, there’s HOPE.
A lot of fathers are finding themselves at home, facing new challenges. How has parenting and fatherhood changed, due to COVID-19?
COVID has created a lot of need for adjustment. I empathize with those of us who are experiencing a financial hit right now, for those of us who may not be able to see or have quality time with their kids. There’s a worldview, that is false, that [men] should be omnipotent, the providers, not show a lot of weakness, and make sure that we’re balancing and living a life of all strengths. There’s no opportunity for failure. And that myth has really consumed a lot of men.
Comments (0)