FATHER's DAY / Another Brick in the Wall / Today Show clip / Texas - 6/12/08

Thu Jun 12 15:43:31 EDT 2008

- DADDIES: ADD YOUR BRICK TO THE WALL
- WELL DONE SALUTE TO FATHERS ON THE TODAY SHOW
- TEXAS FAMILY INSTITUTE TO PROMOTE MARRIAGE INITIATIVE
- INFERTILITY REQUEST

########################

- DADDIES: ADD YOUR BRICK TO THE WALL

Diane, 
National Fatherhood Initiative (NFI) is announcing a unique opportunity for
readers of the Smart Marriages list to begin contributing to a new website
designed to celebrate, encourage and strengthen African American marriage.

NFI¹s ³What¹s Your Legacy?² media campaign inspires African American fathers
(or men who are thinking about having children) to consider marriage for its
benefits to the well-being of their children. The campaign¹s radio, print,
and outdoor messages feature the images and stories of real-life, married,
African American fathers who have built strong legacies for their families
through their healthy marriages. These inspirational stories serve to
encourage their younger peers to consider how important marriage will be in
their journey to build a legacy for their own families.

To begin documenting the strong legacy of marriage in the African American
community, the What¹s Your Legacy? campaign is supported by the brand new
website featuring the interactive African American Marriage Wall. The
African American Marriage Wall allows visitors to add a ³brick² to the Wall
that contains text and photos telling their families¹ marriage story. As
more and more families add their marriage story to the African American
Marriage Wall, it will serve as a place where the community¹s marriage
heritage can be kept alive and passed on to inspire generations to come.
Before we release the website more broadly, we are hopeful that the folks in
the Smart Marriages community will add bricks and forward this link to
others who will add bricks as well.

Visit http://legacy.fatherhood.org  today to add your brick to the African
American Marriage Wall and to find helpful information on building and
maintaining a healthy marriage.

Roland Warren 
President 
National Fatherhood Initiative
http://www.fatherhood.org
Email: rwarren at fatherhood.org

######################

- WELL DONE SALUTE TO FATHERS ON THE TODAY SHOW

For a special treat, watch these three dads talk about being engaged fathers
that model what it's all about for their kids.  Includes George Forman,
father of 5 sons and 5 daughters and Roland Warren of NFI.  All three of
these men grew up without fathers and give some great insights. This is
good. Watch it here:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/25094816#25094784

#####################
- TEXAS FAMILY INSTITUTE TO PROMOTE MARRIAGE INITIATIVE

Reporter News (Abilene)
June 12, 2008

THIS is what the workshop, "Texas, How'd They Do It?!" will talk about.

> 719 - Saturday, San Francisco Smart Marriages Conference
> Texas: How¹d They Do It!?!
> Daphine Lambert, PhD, Jeff Johnson, Maggie Russell, Erin Kincaid
> In 2007, a grassroots coalition passed major legislation that provides $15
> million in state marriage education funding. Lessons learned, challenges, and
> guidelines for your state.

Texas Family Institute to promote marriage initiative

The Texas Health and Human Services Commission has named Texas Family
Institute, a local nonprofit, one of 12 regional intermediaries for the
³Twogether in Texas² Healthy Marriage initiative.

As a regional intermediary, the Texas Family Institute will be responsible
for ensuring healthy marriage services are available in its 30 county region
extending from Brown and Coleman counties to Wichita County, and from Nolan
County to Young County.

The healthy marriage initiative in Texas is intended to promote FREE,
skills-based marriage education and provide couples with the tools they need
to manage the challenges inherent in relationships. Extensive research has
shown that couples who receive relationship education have more stable
relationships, thereby increasing favorable outcomes not only for
themselves, but for their children.

Classes will be taught in various venues around the region and include eight
hours of training focusing on communication skills, conflict resolution and
the elements of a healthy marriage. Classes will benefit couples who are
seriously dating, engaged to marry and those married for any length of time.

****Beginning Sept. 1, engaged couples completing the class will have the
added benefit of having the $60 of their marriage license fee waived, and
they will not have to wait 72 hours to get married.

****Texas has allotted $950,000 to each of the 12 regional intermediaries
(!!!) to build capacity to provide healthy marriage services. Healthy
Marriage classes will be offered free beginning Sept. 1.

For more information, call Suzanne Perkins or Rusty McLen at Texas Family
Institute at (325) 670-0959, or go to abilenecounseling.com.
E.W. Scripps Co.

########################
- INFERTILITY REQUEST

> Diane, 
> Could you please resend the article on infertility to me?  It was
> unfortunately deleted from my computer.
> Gregg

JUST visit the archive - everything I ever send to the list is there:
Please do not reply to this email. This mailbox is not monitored and you
will not receive a response.

Send submissions and comments for the listserv or for list moderator, Diane
Sollee, to: diane at smartmarriages.com  (In other words, do NOT simply hit
"reply". If you hit reply your email will disappear into cyberspace.)

This is a moderated list. Submissions and comments are read by Diane Sollee.
Please indicate if your comment is NOT to be shared with the list.  PLEASE
include your email address and/or url as part of your signature.

With thousands of subscribers, not all comments can be shared. Also realize
that opinions expressed are not necessarily shared by members of the
Coalition.

To SUBSCRIBE, UNSUBSCRIBE, or Change your subscription address,
visit: http://www.smartmarriages.com/app/Newsletter.Subscribe

To read past posts to the listserv, visit the Archive at:
http://lists101.his.com/pipermail/smartmarriages/

12th Annual Smart Marriages® Conference, Hilton San Francisco Hotel,
June 30-July 6, 2008  (General Conference July 2-5)
Pre-Conference Training Institutes June 30-July 2
Post-Conference Training Institutes July 6
DOWNLOAD a conference brochure and register at:
http://www.smartmarriages.com/download.brochure.html

List your program and resources on the Directory of Classes at
http://www.smartmarriages.com/directory_browse.html

Order conference audio & video CD/DVD/MP3s: 800-241-7785 or
http://www.iPlaybackSmartMarriages.com

Coalition for Marriage, Family and Couples Education, LLC (CMFCE)
Diane Sollee, Director
5310 Belt Rd NW, Washington, DC 20015-1961
http://www.smartmarriages.com
202-362-3332

FAIR USE NOTICE: This e-newsletter/site contains copyrighted material the
use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright
owner. We make such material available in our efforts to advance
understanding of marriage, family, couples, divorce, legislation, family
breakdown, etc. We understand this constitutes a 'fair use' of such material
as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with
Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed
without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the
included information for research and educational purposes. For more
information: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to
use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go
beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

BTW, on the infertility request, remember that I don't just need experts or
authors to present on infertility at the conference, we need people that
have programs/information that others can use in their work with couples.
-diane 