Center for the Study of
Culture, Health, and Human Development
at the
University of Connecticut

Family
Development
Credential

The National FDC Program moved August 1, 2010, to the University of Connecticut, where it is based in a partnership among the Connecticut Children's Medical Center, the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine, and the Center for the Study of Culture, Health and Human Development (CHHD). This move provides the FDC Program with many features formerly provided by Cornell University.

The new FDC National Office is located in UConn's main campus in Storrs, CT. Its home, the CHHD, is a university-wide unit established in 1998 to promote interdisciplinary research, training, and outreach related to human development and health in cultural context. Connecticut Children's Medical Center, a free-standing children's hospital in Hartford and the home of the Department of Pediatrics of the School of Medicine, provide administrative support to the Program.

For questions on the Family Development Credential program, please contact FDC Program Manager Melanie Marante, whose hours are M-F 9:00-12:30. Melanie is bilingual English/Spanish. Here is her contact information:

Melanie Marante
National FDC Program Manager
University of Connecticut, Unit 2058
348 Mansfield Road
Storrs, CT 06269-2058
Phone 860-486-0606
Fax 860-486-0300
Email: NationalFDC@UConn.edu

Today the Family Development Credential program continues to provide frontline workers with the knowledge and skills they need to coach families to set and reach their own goals for healthy self-reliance in their communities. Coaches and clients use the Family Development Plan to focus their sessions on reaching the client's goals. The interagency FDC program is available in communities across the state and country to frontline workers from public, private and non-profit service systems (e.g., home visitors, case managers, family resource center workers, community health workers). To earn the FDC, workers take 90 hours of classes based on Empowerment Skills for Family Workers (Forest 2003), complete a portfolio documenting their ability to apply these concepts and skills, and pass a standardized exam. The first FDC credentials were issued by Cornell’s School of Continuing Education in December 1997. Since then more than 6,000 family workers in New York State have earned the FDC; thousands more have earned the FDC through affiliated systems in other states. Many workers earn college credit for earning the FDC, through local community colleges, or PONSI-affiliated universities and colleges nationwide.

The official Family Development Credential Program trains and coordinates official FDC instructors, updates the FDC curriculum as new research emerges, provides "Getting Started" services to new states, and conducts and inspires new FDC-related research. Eighteen states now have FDC systems based on the model developed at Cornell; more are developing with our help.

Comprehensive FDC training and field advisement is available through official training programs in local communities across New York State and many other states.

For information about where FDC programs are offered, contact FDC Program Manager Melanie Marante at NationalFDC@UConn.edu  or by telephone at: (860) 486-0606. 

For support for FDC training programs or to discuss "Getting Started" consultation in your state, please contact Dr. Claire Forest at CND3@cornell.edu.