Meet Kathy

Dr. Kathy Masarie is generous in heart and spirit.  Her caring commitment to the well-being of families touches all facets of her life. In her pediatric practice in the late 1980s and 1990s, Kathy spent extra time getting to know each family.

A quote from Mary Pipher, author of Reviving Ophelia—“Raising your family in isolation is like buying a first-class ticket on the Titanic”—was foremost in Kathy Masarie’s mind as she worked. From many professional experiences, she knew how lonely parents can feel in today’s culture. She saw parents, especially parents of teens, struggling in isolation with family-centered problems such as pregnancy, depression, risky drinking and drug use.

Jon, Kathy, Chip and Kaitlin

With their own teens, Kathy and her husband, Chip, experienced how hard and sometimes embarrassing it was to share parenting struggles with others. Dr. Masarie saw families with younger children networking with each other and decided to provide a continuum of support for families from infancy through adolescence.

In 1996, she founded the non-profit organization Full Esteem Ahead and then Family Empowerment Network to “support parents to support kids and one another.” She began to focus her energy on creating these parenting guides.

Since then, Raising Our Daughters and Raising Our Sons Parenting Guides have provided parents, school professionals and other caring adults with a powerful vehicle for learning, self-discovery, networking and connecting with kids. These Guides respond to parents’ critical needs to facilitate honest and authentic communication, to support their children, and to build family-friendly communities.

Under Kathy’s supervision, the guides were initially created by a team of volunteers who gathered the best information from over 200 books and articles about girls and boys. In 2009 Kathy and her co-writers, Kathy Keller Jones, a school counselor, and Jody Bellant Scheer, a pediatrician, updated and expanded Raising Our Daughters and Raising Our Sons to meet the growing needs of parents in this complex world.

Today, Kathy continues to spread the word about the power of parent networking through presentations, seminars and classes. She is also available for one-on-one parent, individual or family coaching.