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Embracing Home Visits: Honoring Parents and Strengthening Communities
NNPA NEWSWIRE — This might look like encouraging positive parenting practices or helping parents develop their children’s early math and reading skills. Home visitors can also help parents find resources in their communities, like daycare, health care, and more.

Miriam Westheimer, Founder of the National Home Visiting Network and Chief Program Officer of Home Instruction for Parents of Preschool Youngers (HIPPY)
The transition to parenthood is far from easy – and even more difficult if parents don’t have support. Studies show that less than half of parents feel prepared for parenthood before the birth of their first baby, and only 18% feel confident as parents after their child arrives. While many external factors can affect a parent’s early experiences with their children, one thing is clear: new parents need support from people who understand their experiences.
Home visiting programs, like Home Instruction for Parents of Preschool Youngsters (HIPPY), can help. These successful programs redefine empowerment. Under these models, designated community members, known as home visitors, don’t “bestow” power upon parents. Instead, home visitors affirm that parents simply need support to elevate their natural abilities. To provide that support, home visitors work alongside parents and other primary caregivers in a child’s home, taking family needs into account to tailor support. This might look like encouraging positive parenting practices or helping parents develop their children’s early math and reading skills. Home visitors can also help parents find resources in their communities, like daycare, health care, and more.
Peer-to-peer engagement is a central and striking feature of home visits. Often, the home visitors are parents themselves and draw on personal experience to connect with families. This model underscores a truth too often overlooked: credentials alone do not define an educator. Instead, genuine empathy among parents can be just as — if not more — impactful. Home visiting programs use peer-to-peer knowledge sharing to build on parents’ unique understanding of their children in three key ways:
- Parents are their children’s first teachers — and can have long-term positive effects on their children’s futures. Home visitors often teach parents the basics of educational play. This form of play has demonstrable positive developmental effects on children, specifically on early literacy, math, social and emotional, and other cognitive skills. These positive effects persist even after a child’s participation in a home visiting program has been concluded. As a result of home visiting programs and parents’ educational play, children experience increased school readiness, and participants will have higher rates of both school and college attendance. Children’s younger siblings often benefit from their older siblings’ participation, as well. Over the longer term, participants will see higher lifetime earnings totals due to their increased educational attainment and better employment outcomes.
- Parents can affect change beyond their own child’s education. We need to celebrate home visiting models not just as educational tools, but also as catalysts for civic engagement. Parents gain confidence from teaching their children, which empowers them to advocate within their communities. These programs are guided by the ethos of neighbors working alongside one another — a “we,” not an “I.” Through these relationships, parents see that it’s possible to initiate change on their blocks, in their neighborhoods, and their communities. And parents can go to civic meetings, stand up, and say, “I’m a parent, and these issues matter to me.” They move beyond passive roles to become active participants in their communities, influencing local policies and championing causes that affect not only their children but also our collective future.
- Parents find new opportunities to learn and grow as both parents and professionals. But programs like HIPPY don’t just inspire parents to participate in civic engagement. They also give parents a professional path forward. Through experiences in home visiting programs, some parents unlock a passion for early childhood education, leading to work as home visitors, pre-K professionals, or even K-12 educators. These parents are then inspired to share their knowledge with other parents, and they apply for jobs and are hired to work for programs like HIPPY as part of an individual equity accelerator model. In fact, after participating in the program, home visitors often experience an increase in their educational attainment and wages in the long run. Many home visitors are also incentivized to continue their education and develop their careers, moving into nonprofit management with home-visiting partner organizations or community organizing. Home visitors invest in parents, and parents invest in their children. This kind of “triple workforce” development uplifts everybody, from kids to parents to entrepreneurs.
While becoming a parent can be challenging, programs like HIPPY can make the process easier—and empower parents in new ways. Home visiting programs are about so much more than teaching parents how to facilitate educational activities for their children. They are also powerful platforms for transforming parents into community leaders and advocates, redefining what it means to educate and engage.
HIPPY has dedicated staff, school partners, service agencies, community leaders, advocates, and families in 20 states and the District of Columbia, comprising a total of 96 HIPPY sites. HIPPY is a free program for parents of children ages 2, 3, or 4. To learn more about HIPPY, who qualifies, and where it’s available, please visit https://www.hippyus.org/
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Remembering George Floyd
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OP-ED: Oregon Bill Threatens the Future of Black Owned Newspapers and Community Journalism
BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — Nearly half of Oregon’s media outlets are now owned by national conglomerates with no lasting investment in local communities. According to an OPB analysis, Oregon has lost more than 90 news jobs (and counting) in the past five years. These were reporters, editors and photographers covering school boards, investigating corruption and telling community stories, until their jobs were cut by out-of-state corporations.

By Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr.
President and CEO, National Newspaper Publishers Association
For decades, The Skanner newspaper in Portland, the Portland Observer, and the Portland Medium have served Portland, Oregon’s Black community and others with a vital purpose: to inform, uplift and empower. But legislation now moving through the Oregon Legislature threatens these community news institutions—and others like them.
As President and CEO of the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), which represents more than 255 Black-owned media outlets across the United States—including historic publications like The Skanner, Portland Observer, and the Portland Medium—l believe that some Oregon lawmakers would do more harm than good for local journalism and community-owned publications they are hoping to protect.
Oregon Senate Bill 686 would require large digital platforms such as Google and Meta to pay for linking to news content. The goal is to bring desperately needed support to local newsrooms. However, the approach, while well-intentioned, puts smaller, community-based publications at a future severe financial risk.
We need to ask – will these payments paid by tech companies benefit the journalists and outlets that need them most? Nearly half of Oregon’s media outlets are now owned by national conglomerates with no lasting investment in local communities. According to an OPB analysis, Oregon has lost more than 90 news jobs (and counting) in the past five years. These were reporters, editors, and photographers covering school boards, investigating corruption, and telling community stories, until their jobs were cut by out-of-state corporations.
Legislation that sends money to these national conglomerate owners—without the right safeguards to protect independent and community-based outlets—rewards the forces that caused this inequitable crisis in the first place. A just and inclusive policy must guarantee that support flows to the front lines of local journalism and not to the boardrooms of large national media corporations.
The Black Press exists to fill in the gaps left by larger newsrooms. Our reporters are trusted messengers. Our outlets serve as forums for civic engagement, accountability and cultural pride. We also increasingly rely on our digital platforms to reach our audiences, especially younger generations—where they are.
We are fervently asking Oregon lawmakers to take a step back and engage in meaningful dialogue with those most affected: community publishers, small and independent outlets and the readers we serve. The Skanner, The Portland Observer, and The Portland Medium do not have national corporate parents or large investors. And they, like many smaller, community-trusted outlets, rely on traffic from search engines and social media to boost advertising revenue, drive subscriptions, and raise awareness.
Let’s work together to build a better future for Black-owned newspapers and community journalism that is fair, local,l and representative of all Oregonians.
Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis Jr., President & CEO, National Newspaper Publishers Association
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Hate and Chaos Rise in Trump’s America
BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — Tactics ranged from local policy manipulation to threats of violence. The SPLC documented bomb threats at 60 polling places in Georgia, traced to Russian email domains.

By Stacy M. Brown
Black Press USA Senior National Correspondent
The Southern Poverty Law Center has identified 1,371 hate and antigovernment extremist groups operating across the United States in 2024. In its latest Year in Hate & Extremism report, the SPLC reveals how these groups are embedding themselves in politics and policymaking while targeting marginalized communities through intimidation, disinformation, and violence. “Extremists at all levels of government are using cruelty, chaos, and constant attacks on communities and our democracy to make us feel powerless,” said SPLC President Margaret Huang. The report outlines how hard-right groups aggressively targeted diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives throughout 2024. Figures on the far right falsely framed DEI as a threat to white Americans, with some branding it a form of “white genocide.” After the collapse of Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge, a former Utah legislator blamed the incident on DEI, posting “DEI = DIE.”
Tactics ranged from local policy manipulation to threats of violence. The SPLC documented bomb threats at 60 polling places in Georgia, traced to Russian email domains. Similar threats hit Jewish institutions and Planet Fitness locations after far-right social media accounts attacked them for trans-inclusive policies. Telegram, which SPLC describes as a hub for hate groups, helped extremists cross-recruit between neo-Nazi, QAnon, and white nationalist spaces. The platform’s lax moderation allowed groups like the Terrorgram Collective—designated terrorists by the U.S. State Department—to thrive. Militia movements were also reorganized, with 50 groups documented in 2024. Many, calling themselves “minutemen,” trained in paramilitary tactics while lobbying local governments for official recognition. These groups shared personnel and ideology with white nationalist organizations.
The manosphere continued to radicalize boys and young men. The Fresh & Fit podcast, now listed as a hate group, promoted misogyny while mocking and attacking Black women. Manosphere influencers used social media algorithms to drive youth toward male-supremacy content. Turning Point USA played a key role in pushing white nationalist rhetoric into mainstream politics. Its leader Charlie Kirk claimed native-born Americans are being replaced by immigrants, while the group advised on Project 2025 and organized Trump campaign events. “We know that these groups build their power by threatening violence, capturing political parties and government, and infesting the mainstream discourse with conspiracy theories,” said Rachel Carroll Rivas, interim director of the SPLC’s Intelligence Project. “By exposing the players, tactics, and code words of the hard right, we hope to dismantle their mythology and inspire people to fight back.”
Click here for the full report or visit http://www.splcenter.org/resources/guides/year-hate-extremism-2024.
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