In this episode, host Valerie Frost speaks with Daniela Molina, lived experience leader and financial empowerment coach at the Liberation Family Resource Center in Richmond, Virginia. Liberation is part of the Family Resource Center cohort within the Thriving Families, Safer Children initiative, and it exemplifies what it means to be truly embedded in the community.

Daniela shares how Liberation uses a two-generation approach to create a trusted and consistent presence for families. Liberation not only meets immediate needs like food, housing, and financial coaching, they create long-term leadership and empowerment with the families in their community. In a powerful story that begins with a child referring their own mother to the center, we hear how deep trust and psychological safety can open doors that traditional systems often miss.

Daniela and Valerie explore how building authentic, trauma-informed relationships helps families feel safe enough to return, not just for support, but to give back, lead, and create change. This episode lifts up why community-rooted Family Resource Centers are at the core of transformational support.

Check Out Community In-Site's Blog!! You can go to the website to listen to episodes, read the blog, access information and resources, and subscribe to the email newsletter. Community In-Site Blog - Thriving Families

Here are some additional resources Daniela would like to share with you.

• Liberation Family Resource Center
• Thriving Families, Safer Children | familiesforwardva
• Family Resource Centers: Working with African American Families
• NFSN | Standards of Quality

We appreciate you spreading awareness by sharing this episode with your friends, family, and colleagues who care about family well-being.

Please email us if you want to connect with the creative team or find out how to engage with the family well-being movement. comminsite@gmail.com

In recognition of five years of the Thriving Families, Safer Children initiative, this episode highlights the power of youth and adult partnership. Valerie sits down with Alayna Leonard, a youth advocate and former member of Indiana’s Commission for Improving the Status of Children, and Sam Garman, a national youth engagement consultant with Cetera. Together, they share the story of how authentic, sustained engagement through the TFSC Youth Learning Action Network led to real policy change, culminating in a new law in Indiana that requires youth to be included in public policy decision-making.

What began as a cohort focused on relationship-building evolved into a movement, with adult allies becoming champions for youth leadership across systems. This conversation lifts up the core TFSC principle of partnering with people with lived experience and shows what’s possible when we truly support, not just involve, young people.

Check Out Community In-Site's Blog!! You can go to the website to listen to episodes, read the blog, access information and resources, and subscribe to the email newsletter. Community In-Site Blog - Thriving Families

Here are some additional resources Alayna and Sam would like to share with you.

• CitizenPortal.ai - Indiana Commission strengthens youth engagement with House Bill 1098
• CISC: Youth, Family, and Caregiver Engagement

We appreciate you spreading awareness by sharing this episode with your friends, family, and colleagues who care about family well-being.

Please email us if you want to connect with the creative team or find out how to engage with the family well-being movement. comminsite@gmail.com

In this episode, Valerie Frost talks with Dr. David Sanders, Executive Vice President of Systems Improvement at Casey Family Programs and one of the early visionaries behind the Thriving Families, Safer Children initiative.

As the initiative marks its fifth anniversary, David reflects on the bold idea that sparked it: the belief that we must shift from a system centered on child removal to one that supports families and promotes child and community wellbeing. Together, David and Valerie explore how the dominant intervention in child protection for the past 40 years, family separation, has shaped the system, and why a different path is both possible and necessary.

David shares how real change requires more than individual will, it demands a reimagining of parenting, policy, and prevention. He highlights the foundational principles of the Thriving Families initiative, including partnering with people with lived expertise, addressing racial equity, and centering community-based solutions.

This episode is ultimately about systems change, the courage to confront outdated practices, and the ongoing work of building something better, for all families.

Check Out Community In-Site's Blog!! You can go to the website to listen to episodes, read the blog, access information and resources, and subscribe to the email newsletter. Podcasts Archive - Thriving Families

Here are some additional resources Dr. Sanders would like to share with you.

• Sharing Power – Casey Family Programs
• Engagement of Co-Designers – Casey Family Programs
• Child Welfare Co-Design – Casey Family Programs
• Lifting Up Voices - Casey Family Programs

We appreciate you spreading awareness by sharing this episode with your friends, family, and colleagues who care about family well-being.

Please email us if you want to connect with the creative team or find out how to engage with the family well-being movement. comminsite@gmail.com