Talaris Research Institute, a nonprofit based in Seattle, and KCTS/Seattle Public Television are launching the second year of Parenting Counts: A Focus on Early Learning. The parenting education initiative is now available in nearly 50 communities through PBS’s national “Ready To Learn” service. Parenting educators are attending the Talaris Parenting Counts conference in Seattle this week to learn how parents can support a child’s healthy social and emotional development from birth through five.

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Talaris Research Institute announces two senior staff appointments, Brenda Blasingame as Director of Programs and Sherry Catron Wong as Director of Product Strategy. Both will help Talaris translate early learning research into practical knowledge for parents. They bring expertise in public-private partnerships, philanthropy, early learning and national program development.

“The science is clear, babies are born with remarkable learning abilities and parents are the key in developing those abilities. But parents need help applying the research to everyday life,” says Terrence Meersman, executive director, Talaris Research Institute. “Brenda and Sherry bring experience in designing programs and curriculum to do just that.”

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Parents and caregivers across the United States will have access to a new source of information designed to help them facilitate children’s learning when KCTS/Seattle Public Television and Talaris Research Institute present Parenting Counts: A Focus on Early Learning, a public information initiative designed to help adults understand the importance of parenting in the early years. Unique to the PBS system, the initiative is centered around six 60-second on-air spots aimed at providing parents, childcare providers and parent education specialists with an engaging, informative and useful look at how young minds develop. These spots have been fed via satellite to all 349 PBS stations.

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Talaris Research Institute and the Children’s Museum of Tacoma (CMT) announced the opening of a new interactive exhibit targeted to parents and childcare providers who visit the museum with their children. The exhibit is called the “Learning Lounge” and features the collaboration of acclaimed family researcher Dr. John Gottman. Gottman is partnering with Talaris on other research projects and has provided feedback on the exhibit, which focuses on his five steps to emotional learning. The museum closed for one week for construction of the exhibit and recently re-opened to the public.

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Talaris Research Institute announced today the appointment of Terrence Meersman as Executive Director. He will assume this role beginning in June. Meersman comes to Talaris as a recognized national leader in private foundation management. He most recently served as Executive Vice President and Director of Programs for the Virginia G. Piper Charitable Trust, which is the largest foundation in Arizona supporting early childhood, youth, elderly and arts programs. Prior to his work in Arizona, Meersman served as Senior Program Officer and Director of Finance and Administration for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation during its start-up years. He also served as Executive Vice President of Save the Children and Venture Fund Program Officer for The Pew Charitable Trusts.

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When a baby arrives, everything changes and these changes often have profound effects on new parents, marriages and the newly arrived infant. Recognizing the increased interpersonal, social and economic pressure families experience—especially fragile families with low to poverty-level household incomes—Talaris Research Institute announced that its first sponsored initiative with renowned researcher Dr. John Gottman will focus on learning more about the changes couples experience as they become parents and discovering ways to help parents make the transition with greater ease and success. The research initiative is called “Bringing Baby Home” and is expected to produce an educational program for expectant parents that can be placed in more than 2,500 hospitals across the United States. The study is funded by a four-year, $2.3 million grant by Talaris and a grant by the Kirlin Foundation.

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