Ohio University Partners with Parenting Project
Ohio University has joined a new family support program designed to more effectively balance the time that divorced parents spend with their children.The project, called Parenting Time Opportunities for Children to the 12th power, or PTOC12, is a federally funded project.The project was undertaken by Fairfield County’s Job and Family Services Department in Lancaster, Ohio. The federal grant that is funding this $400,000 project was received from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services on Oct. 2.The four-year project also involves 12 Ohio counties and includes officials from multiple government departments, as well as establishing a partnership with Ohio University’s College of Health Sciences and Professions.Randy Leite, dean of the college and a professor of child and family studies, is leading this project for the university. Staff of the College of Health Sciences and Professions, as well as students within the colleges, are expected to participate by helping to measure the effectiveness of the programs instituted by PTOC12.The project aims to help establish more efficient legal practices in cases of domestic divorces. Initially, it will attempt to legally ensure that court orders for shared parenting time are established concurrently with issues of child support payments. The hope is to establish more than 2,000 patrenting time orders during the life of the project.Leite’s interest in the project is his efforts to establish a University Institute for Fathers and Families. The Ohio Practitioners Network for Fathers and Families is a program that aims to aid the lives of children by promoting and attempting to increase the number of families that include responsible fathers.Ohio University will help in determining the method’s effectiveness by measuring financial costs, the number of parenting time orders established by the project and the number that are associated with child support orders.“Parents are often in favor of establishing both orders at the same time, and payments of child support are more consistent when there is a healthy parental bond,” said Carrie Brown, deputy director of Fairfield County Job and Family Services.If successful, PTOC12 could be implemented statewide.“The project will inform state and national policy,” said Leite. “The opportunity to connect scholarly interests with the practical matter of improving lives and the well-being of children is exciting.”