A common linguistic mistake has it that the Chinese word for “Crisis” is a combination of the characters for danger and opportunity. While this is not technically true, it has been so widely accepted that even native Chinese speakers have picked it up. I like to think that’s because it is an idea that rings true for us: There is always opportunity in a crisis. Our current health crisis of the coronavirus is no exception. 

A crisis is just a big problem, and problem solving is what we humans do best. When we solve problems together—cooperatively—we can get very creative. And that creativity often results in innovations that not only help us get through the crisis but also continue to benefit us all long after it has been resolved. 

This blog is about one such innovation. As we were thinking “in house” about ways to help leaders and parents who are working from home during this crisis, some of you were doing the same thing. Put another way: 

THE PROBLEM: How to lead an Active Parenting course while everyone is confined to their own homes:

And THE SOLUTION that we and many of you came up with: allow leaders to offer their courses over the internet through platforms already available for just that.

There is an urgent need and a new opportunity to meet that need. We all need to step up together to use online meeting platforms such as, zoom, webx, gotomeetings, and others in order to offer our parenting courses to parents at home. Not only will this help us all stay safer right now, it will provide some much needed adult social interaction, enable leaders to keep doing their important work, and help parents learn a model of parenting that will last a lifetime.

We’ve made it easy and inexpensive. You can simply use your existing Active Parenting course materials from your own computer and the web platform of your choice to teach your course much like you always have. While the crisis is ongoing there will be NO CHARGE for the permission to lead AP courses over the internet. All we expect is that you purchase the appropriate Parent Guide for each participant. We can even mail them directly to your parents if you need us to. (And you actually buying the books will allow us to survive during this crisis, too. So please, no cutting corners there.) 

We are all looking forward to seeing this innovation in action in parenting education. I have long believed that the internet holds the future for helping us reach all parents in all places. 

As always, thank you for what you do for parents (in person AND online).

Michael Popkin
President and CEO
Active Parenting Publishers.

PS. For more information on our new Virtual Parenting education options, contact us at 800-825-0060 Ext. 2.