For the video of this event, summary and resources visit our blog here
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Research confirms that the role parents play in the later part of their children’s lives—from the final days of childhood to the threshold of adulthood—is as important as any other life stage. And this is precisely the time our parenting experts and community abandons us. The problems teens and young adults may face require respecting their privacy, driving us further into isolation. As the college years loom, kids are constantly changing and how we parent them must change, too. But how do we stay close as a family as our lives move apart?
Lisa Heffernan and Mary Dell Harrington started the online community “Grown and Flown” seven years ago out of necessity. They were parenting teens themselves and often felt isolated with their problems. Unmoored from the close-knit baby and early childhood parenting groups and play date interactions, they discovered the teen and young-adult parenting years were conspicuously devoid of resources and community. Today, Grown and Flown is recognized as the #1 website and online community for parents of teens, college students, and young adults, with content that is updated daily with contributions from 500 writers that include parents, experts, physicians, student advisors, psychologists, and educators.
Hefferman and Harrington’s GPS presentation is based on their book, Grown and Flown: How to Support Your Teen, Stay Close as a Family, and Raise Independent Adults and will offer support and perspective on parenting and launching teens and young adults. They will address family life, mental health, love, academics, separating and letting go, and college life, drawing expert advice from physicians, psychologists, educators, and writers. (Their book features insights from current and former GPS speakers Lisa Damour, Ph.D., Lori Gottlieb, Ken Ginsburg, M.D., Frank Bruni, and Rachel Simmons among others!)
Mary Dell Harrington and Lisa (Endlich) Heffernan are writers (Lisa is a New York Times best-selling author), moms, wives, and friends. In past incarnations they have worked in television and media, on Wall Street and in politics. Mary Dell has her MBA from the Harvard Business School and Lisa has an MBA from the MIT Sloan School of Management. Lisa has written for The New York Times, Washington Post, The Atlantic, Vox, Forbes among others. They have appeared on The TODAY Show and were named by People magazine as 25 Women Changing the World.
