What We Do

The One Family Programmes Service provides adult education and training to people parenting alone or sharing parenting. The service aims to develop and provide a range of best-practice employability programmes that empower people to take the next steps into education or work.

Our New Steps Personal Development  and New Futures Employability Programmes are free and provide lone parents with the skills and support they need to progress to education and employment. Everyone who participates in our programmes has access to regular one-to-one support and other wraparound family supports.

We understand the experience of parenting alone and sharing parenting and how challenging it can be to move back into education or find fulfilling employment. Our employability programmes are unique because they are specifically designed for lone parents who want to return to  education or work but are not sure where to start.

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Hear From Our Participants

“Since completing the New Futures Programme, I have experienced a tremendous transformation in my personal and professional life. Not only have I acquired new skills and knowledge, but I have also gained a renewed sense of confidence and self-belief in myself.”

“New Futures goes the extra mile in helping participants to identify their strengths & aspirations and then how to actively pursue them, with supports in place. One Family have managed to do all this because they’re coming from a place that truly understands what life can be like as a single parent in Ireland, and as well as all the down-to-earth and compassionate understanding they give they also offer the belief that things can get better, that you do matter, that you have value & that you can achieve your goals and that’s invaluable really because sometimes when you’ve lost sight of that yourself as a tired and burnout single parent you need someone else who believes in you and who will actively help you to move forward, until such time as you can believe these things for yourself again.”

“I would whole-heartedly recommend the New Futures course for anyone who, like me, ever thought that they had nothing to offer an employer, or anyone who, again like me, had been out of the loop for so long that the thought of further education seemed like an impossible dream or something that was nothing to do with them. I used to feel like I had no right to even contemplate doing such a thing, that it wasn’t an option that was open to single mothers with kids”

“The New Steps programme was a god send! I learned how to deal with so many different emotions I was struggling with and instead of letting them get on top of me I learned new strategies to cope with them and not let them weigh me down. I also learned to look at life from a different perspective. “

“Suddenly, with the support of One Family, all the barriers that restricted me from following my dream simply fell away. Mental barriers, practical barriers and financial barriers all disappeared.”

Click here to read more about what our participants say.

Our Programmes team and New Futures participant, Michelle, accepting an AONTAS STAR Award in March, 2023. We previously won the award in 2019.

Our Funders