Common Practices for Divorce Education

• Published date: 01 July 2020
• Author: David G. Schramm,Emily H. Becher
• Date: 01 July 2020
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12444

D G. S Utah State University

E H. B University of Minnesota

Common Practices for Divorce Education

Co-parenting plays a key role in children’s out-

comes when parents dissolve their intimate rela-

tionship. As a result, educators have developed

divorce education programs to support healthy

co-parenting and parenting practices among

parents going through the process of separa-

tion and divorce. Despite much progress, chal-

lenges remain concerning how to measure the

impact of divorce education programs, limita-

tions in research and evaluation study design,

and development and delivery of programming

tailored to unique contexts. In this article, we

aim to provide scholars and practitioners an

overview of common practices related to divorce

education. Additionally, we examine promis-

ing areas for growth to encourage scholar-

ship that can move beyond describing common

practices toward recommending best practices

that increase positive outcomes for families who

experience divorce.

Divorce has become a common process for

many families in the United States, with a

divorce rate of 2.9 per 1,000 in population for

the United States in 2018 (Centers for Disease

Control and Prevention, 2020). Many couples

who divorce have children together and in

2014, 36% of all divorced women had at least

one minor biological child living with them

(Eickmeyer, 2016), with an unknown number

Department of Human Development & FamilyStudies, Utah

State University, 2705 Old Main, Logan, UT 84322-2705

(david.schramm@usu.edu).

Key Words: best practices, co-parenting, divorce, divorce

education, parenting.

of mothers with minor children living else-

where (e.g., with their fathers or grandparents).

With hundreds of thousands of separations and

divorces now occurring each year in the United

States, awareness of the numerous nancial,

emotional, physical, and legal stresses and

challenges associated with the divorce and sepa-

ration processes have increased (Amato, 2010).

The process of divorce itself also has changed

in recent decades, placing a greater emphasis

on co-parenting as an important construct. A

notable change over the past 3 decades includes

family courts shifting from routinely award-

ing sole physical custody of minor children to

mothers, to now assuming joint physical custody

arrangements (DiFonzo, 2014). Scholars agree

and evidence indicates that, overall, children

fare much better when their parents minimize

their level of conict and work together (i.e.,

when they coparent; McHale, 2007), to the

extent possible, throughout the separation and

divorce process (Amato et al., 2011). However,

it is important to acknowledge that although

cooperative co-parenting is an ideal outcome

for most divorcing parents, some parents face

challenges, including intimate partner violence

(IPV) and interpersonal struggles, that make it

difcult or dangerous to co-parent. For these

cases, the focus should center on being the best

parent they can be to their child(ren) when they

are with them.

To counter the conict and potential neg-

ative consequences of separation and divorce

for both parents and children, numerous legal,

political, and family professionals have devel-

oped a variety of educational interventions to

help parents navigate the legal process, make

Family Relations 69 (July 2020): 543–558 543

DOI:10.1111/fare.12444

544 Family Relations

informed decisions, reduce destructive conict,

and develop or maintain a healthy co-parenting

relationship (e.g., Salem et al., 2013). We col-

lectively label these efforts as divorce education

but acknowledge that many couples who break

up or separate were never legally married. The

overarching objectiveof this article is to describe

common practices within divorce education. The

term common practices is used because this area

of research and practice is relatively young and

few rigorous studies havebeen conducted to con-

vincingly describe “best practices” for divorce

education. As discussed throughout this article,

more research is needed to assess the effec-

tiveness of these common practices, as well

as to purposefully and systematically identify

best practices in divorce education. The primary

aims of this article are to provide scholars and

practitioners with an overview of (a) the histori-

cal evolution of divorce education programs, (b)

general divorce education common practices, (c)

common practices in face-to-face programs, (d)

common practices in online programs, and (e)

common practices in program evaluation. Vari-

ous methodological challenges and questions are

discussed, as well as areas where future research

is needed to move the eld of divorce education

forward and identify best practices.

H O  D

E P

To set the stage for divorce education and where

common practices stand today, we begin with

a brief historical overview and evolution of

co-parenting programs to provide a contex-

tual foundation. One of the rst documented

co-parenting education programs for separating

or divorcing parents (referred to hereafter as

divorce education), General Responsibilities as

Separating Parents (GRASP), was implemented

in 1978 in Johnson County, Kansas (James &

Roeder-Esser, 1994). Early programs generally

focused on helping separating families with

ongoing conict and parent responsibilities

before later expanding to all divorcing couples

with minor children in many states and counties

(Roeder-Esser, 1994).

By the late 1990s, almost half of county courts

throughout the United States either sponsored

a divorce education program or worked with

community agencies to provide programs for

divorcing parents (Geasler & Blaisure, 1999).

Over the past decade, parent education programs

for separating or divorcing parents have become

even more widespread across the United States,

with nearly every state offering some form of

divorce education programming (Mulroy et al.,

2013) and many states and counties mandating

attendance for divorcing couples with depen-

dent children (Cronin et al., 2017). The manda-

tory nature of these programs for couples l-

ing for divorce is timely due to the high lev-

els of conict between parents that is common

during the separation period compared with a

year or two postdivorce (Buehler et al., 1997).

These programs primarily serve an educational

and preventive purpose, rather than delving into

potentially more serious matters that may be bet-

ter managed with counseling or mediation ser-

vices. Although the goals, length, and content of

co-parenting education programs vary to some

degree, the overarching aims are to share infor-

mation regarding the benets for children of

having two involved parents in their lives, pro-

mote positive and workable co-parenting rela-

tionships, reduce negative conict,and help both

parents and children make healthy adjustments

throughout the process (Douglas, 2006).

C P  D E

Early evaluations of divorceeducation programs

revealed that most parents were satised with

the experience, but the programs were often

found lacking in other areas. Blaisure and

Geasler (1996) conducted one of the most com-

prehensive studies of face-to-face co-parenting

education programs. In addition to telephone

interviews with numerous program administra-

tors, their evaluation included an examination of

topics covered, teaching strategies, theoretical

foundations, evaluation methods, and structural

components (e.g., fees, attendance policies). In

total, they reviewed 37 programs offered in 310

of the 541 counties that provided educational

programs for divorcing and separating parents

at the time. In sum, most programs included

information related to children’s needs, min-

imizing conict, and positive co-parenting,

but these early programs often consisted of

passive teaching strategies (i.e., videos, lec-

ture), and many lacked an empirical foundation

and provided little, if any, information about

broader topics, such as the legal process or

co-parenting when a parent deserted the family.

In that same year Blaisure and Geasler’s study

was published, Braver, Salem, Pearson, and