Supporting someone through a journey you’ve never experienced yourself can feel intimidating. And yet, it’s a situation that parent educators find themselves in often. That’s one of the reasons that the HeART Learning Community made an impact on First Step Family Support Center Early Learning Director Krista Hanan.
The HeART learning community gathered affiliates from eight states, as well as research partners/facilitators and national center staff, to share their experiences and findings serving families who have been negatively affected by substance use. This input shaped the creation of enhanced support for parent educators walking similar partnership journeys.
Through her participation, Krista felt affirmation that any parent educator has the potential to guide meaningful conversations around substance use – even if the parent educator has never experienced it personally.
That’s why Krista and her team signed up for our motivational interview training, which focuses on supporting caregivers to access and utilize their internal motivation to apply positive parenting practices. The training is part of the pilot phase of the HeART Learning Community initiative, and its use is provided by Elevance Health Foundation.
“It’s not really always available,” Krista said of this kind of training, so she jumped at the chance for her staff.
Krista notes that while the skills of motivational interviewing are natural, the training serves to elevate intentionality. Since they finished the initial training, there’s already been opportunity to use it.
“It was so great for my team to see … ‘This is how it’s put into practice’,” she said. “That was really cool.”
The one-year pilot of the newly created support package, including a comprehensive collection of resources, began in May 2026. To hear more on the learnings and stories from this initiative, sign up for our newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram, and Facebook. Read more about the project’s goals and the grant investment from Elevance Health Foundation here.