• Lyft. Linking Families and Teens
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LiFT Overview

Linking Families and Teens is a family communication evidence-based program that helps families share their values, build family bonds, and talk about the tough stuff – including sexual health and supportive relationships. Created to fill a need in rural communities (towns with a population of 50,000 or fewer), with some isolation from a larger metropolitan area), it is being successfully implemented in urban and suburban communities. The program:

  • Encourages teens to open up to parenting adults.
  • Helps parenting adults support teens in making healthy choices and achieving their goals.
  • Connects parenting adults in your community.

LiFT is available in English and Spanish.

Description

The Linking Families and Teens (LiFT) program aims to lower unintended teen pregnancy rates and STIs among youth age 13 – 19. The program is delivered through a five-hour family connection workshop designed to improve sexual health outcomes for high school–age youth across the United States. The workshop is intended to increase the frequency and quality of communication about sexuality between teens and their supportive adults, enhance the relationship between teens and these adults, increase teens’ confidence about preventing unwanted pregnancy, increase supportive adults’ comfort with their youth receiving sexual health services, and decrease the number of unplanned teen pregnancies. The workshop can be delivered as one five-hour session, or two three-hour sessions.

Population Served

LiFT was evaluated with rural youth and was designed to serve all youth ages 13 to 19. Each youth must participate with one or more adult parents or caregivers; the program calls them supportive adults. The LiFT program can be implemented in urban, suburban, and rural communities of all sizes.

The ideal group size for a LiFT workshop is 10 – 12 families. However, the workshop has been successfully facilitated with as few as 3 and as many as 30 families. Adaptations will need to be made to the activities for especially large or small groups, and facilitators will need to be prepared to make these adaptations.

LiFT Curriculum Subscription

LiFT subscriptions are now available.

The initial Annual Subscription is $299.99, with an annual renewal rate of $99.99/year. Visit the registration page to sign up. Once completed, visit the Subscription Materials page for access to the LiFT curriculum.

What we’ve heard

Expect to have better conversations. Improvements in communication is by far the most common theme of LiFT stories. LiFT helps family members talk more often and about tough topics including sexuality and relationships. By the end of the workshop you’ll feel more comfortable and confident having these conversations and the skills you learn in LiFT will help you have more effective communication in an open and non-judgmental way.

“I’ve talked with my parent way more than I ever had & I felt closer to him for being there.”

Expect to come together as a family. In addition to a general increase in closeness, past participants have told us they experience increased trust, openness, empathy or understanding, and a sense of support.

“My son has more trust in me now and in our relationship. He comes to me with questions about his relationship with his girlfriend now, and before LiFT he never really wanted to open up to me about his relationships.”

Expect to have fun! Nearly every teen and parent has told us that they had fun during the workshop and would recommend LiFT to others.

“I had a lot of fun participating and it was truly an amazing experience. Every single family with a teenager should take this workshop. Every family needs it.”