The four day Family Place Training Institute provides theoretical grounding in family-centered library services and practical training in the core components of Family Place. The Family Place Training Institute prepares participants to implement the initiative locally and provides a venue for librarians to share experiences and effective practices with one another.

Topics covered include:

• Assets and needs assessment
• Serving families and children through partnerships with other agencies
• Community outreach to new and underserved families
• Coalition building
• Infant brain development
• Child development
• Emergent literacy
• Parent engagement & education
• The Parent-Child Workshop
• Additional programming
• Space design
• Collection development
• Marketing
• Documentation and evaluation

All training participants receive a training manual, relevant books and articles to help implement the Family Place Libraries™ initiative. After completing the training, Family Place Libraries staff provides ongoing technical assistance and site support to all network libraries.