Family Law for Young Parents

 

OJEN’s Family Law for Young Parents (FLYP) program helps young parents build a sense of competence and self-determination. This series of workshops address common legal issues that these youth may face in their own lives and introduces them to the relevant laws and legal processes through experiential learning. Over the course of 3-5 sessions, lawyers work with young parents to develop their advocacy, public speaking, organization and communication skills.

Family Law for Young Mothers: Challenge and Change builds on the success of OJEN’s Family Law for Young Parents (FLYP) program, and offers youth participants a deeper engagement with family law and legal professionals.  The 8 session program uses an interactive, dialogue-based approach to build awareness of family law procedure and processes, and helps young mothers develop and practice legal life skills. Program staff and volunteers share reliable sources of public legal information, and direct the young mothers to local legal and community-based supports. The program also aims to foster connections between the young mothers and justice sector professionals to build respect, empathy, and understanding between them. “Challenge and Change” culminates with young mothers proposing solutions for how people who work within the legal system can help young mothers better address their legal needs and challenges.

The program was first piloted in Hamilton in 2020-2021, with support from the Ontario Trillium Foundation. It is available as either an in-person or virtual program. 

Interested in having one of these programs delivered to your group of young parents? Contact us via our online form.