Building Stronger Relationships
A child’s early relationships are the cornerstone of cognitive and emotional development. When something occurs to disrupt these relationships, the effect can be serious and long lasting. Healthy social-emotional development is essential for success in relationships, in learning and in life.
The JF&CS Infant-Parent Training Institute (IPTI) prepares professionals to address the social and emotional health needs of infants and their parents. This inter-disciplinary program has attracted experienced professionals and a superlative faculty who are dedicated to infant mental health.
Peggy Kaufman, Director of the Center for Early Relationship Support, said, “Training professionals in the early relationship provides a greater number of infants with an inoculation for emotional health.”
The Infant-Parent Training Institute is for experienced professionals who wish to broaden their knowledge and develop skills specific to clinical work with infants and families. It offers an integration of neuro-developmental and psychodynamic approaches to parent-infant psychotherapy.
The students include psychiatrists, educators, psychologists, social workers, and mental health counselors who travel from Greater Boston, Western Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island to study and train at JF&CS.
Together with the agency’s Early Connections program, IPTI offers fellows and students the unique opportunity to receive academic training at a clinical site where research is being conducted as well as clinical service provided. Peggy said, “This program is meeting an enormous training need in the area of parent-infant relationships in Greater Boston.”
In addition to the obvious long-term benefits for parents, infants, and our community, IPTI takes JF&CS to a new level in the world of early parent-infant relationships by providing a home for the growing infant mental health community in Boston. As well as training, master classes, and consultation, IPTI provides opportunities for collaboration, funding, and publication.