The Lifestart Foundation’s core parenting programme has its origins in two early years projects established in the mid 1980s in two very different communities in Ireland: Oiliunt Baile, an early years project located in an economically underdeveloped rural community in the Gaeltacht region of the West of Ireland and the Ballymagroarty Family Support Project, set in Northern Ireland, in an economically and socially deprived urban community, deeply affected by the political conflict.

A home-visitation and parent learning programme, based on local adaptations of the ‘Growing Child’ (Growing Child Inc. www.growingchild.com), was successfully piloted in each of these communities in 1989.  The Growing Child programme was devised by a parent and developed by a group of academics and child development experts working at the University of Purdue, Indiana and since its inception in 1971 it has been made available to and impacted upon the lives of over 5 million children in the United States.  The US programme, delivered to parents as a printed or electronic Newsletter, has been subject to regular review by child development experts and is now in its 4th edition. 

Since 1989 the Lifestart Foundation has continued to promote, develop and adapt the Growing Child programme to meet the needs of contemporary families and those of a variety of distinct local communities and social groups and to refine the content and home-visitation delivery mechanism devised and tested in the two Irish pilot projects. Lifestart projects have since been established in Antrim, Carlow, Derry, Donegal, Dublin, Fermanagh, Kilkenny, Leitrim, Offaly, Sligo, Louth and Tyrone. The Foundation’s head office was established in Derry in 1996 and, with the support of UNICEF, the Foundation set up a national office in Macedonia in 1996 which now has 10 outreach facilities. A Republic of Ireland national office was established in Sligo in January 2000, with the specific aim of providing direct support to Republic of Ireland Lifestart projects, and a Lifestart project was established in Mazabuka Zambia in 2004 which will in the future act as the Zambian national office supporting Lifestart outreach programmes and projects in Central Africa.

In 2005 the Lifestart Foundation drew up a strategic plan for the future development and growth of Lifestart service provision and acquired resources from Atlantic Philanthropies to begin a longitudinal evaluation of Lifestart programme impact. A pilot evaluative study was carried out in 2005-2006 and a revised development strategy and methodology for the full scientific testing of Lifestart outcomes were agreed in June 2007. As part of its strategic developments the Foundation is working to expand service delivery through the development of a range of programme delivery modes and partnerships relationships with statutory bodies, schools and other children and family service providers. Recruitment of 500 families to participate in a random control trial of programme impact began in April 2008. Interim study findings will be published in 2010 and full study findings in 2013.