The advanced marriage and family functioning certificate provides students with a basic understanding of the theory and research related to healthy relationships. Students will also develop skills related to communication, advocacy, and money management.

This certificate is offered by BYU-Idaho, with support and resources from BYU-Pathway Worldwide.

Essential Knowledge and Skills

Outcomes

Communicate effectively in writing regarding marriage and family.
Create practical plans for improving marriage and family functioning.
Synthesize relevant research findings pertaining to marriage and family.
Effectively advocate for marriage and family through persuasive speaking.

Certificate of Advanced Marriage and Family Functioning

Program Requirements

This certificate builds into the Marriage & Family Studies degree.

This is an advanced certificate. Prior to working on this certificate, you must complete Marriage, Family, and Human Relations.

Certificate

15 CREDITS

Associate

60 CREDITS

Bachelor's

120 CREDITS

Certificate of Advanced Marriage and Family Functioning

Course Code

Course Name

# of Credits

FAML300

Marriage

FAML300 — 3 credits

Marriage

This course focuses on contemporary issues affecting marriage, along with skills and principles needed to build strong and successful marriages.

FAML400

Family Theories and Dynamics

FAML400 — 3 credits

Family Theories and Dynamics

This course involves an in-depth look at family theories and their assumptions including: systems theory, exchange theory, family development theory, and symbolic interactionism and ecological theory. Family processes related to power, communication, dysfunctions and addictions, rules and patterns of interaction, distance regulation, and family rituals will be explored. Students will use theory to develop intervention and prevention programs.

FAML460

Child and Family Advocacy

FAML460 — 3 credits

Child and Family Advocacy

This course focuses on current challenges or issues being experienced by children and families and on the development of public policies to address these issues. An ecological approach to the study of policy formation with the aim of gaining knowledge and skills to successfully advocate for appropriate and effective child and family policies will be explored.

MATH221C

Social Science Statistics

MATH221C — 3 credits

Social Science Statistics

In this course students will study graphical representation of data, measures of center and spread, elementary probability, sampling distributions, correlation and regression, statistical inference involving means, proportions, and contingency tables.

PSYCH302

Research Methods

PSYCH302 — 3 credits

Research Methods

This course explores the basic principles of conducting research in psychology. Some of the topics include, but are not limited to: research design, data collection, analysis, reporting results, and ethics of doing research. This course should be completed by the beginning of junior year.

For questions about this program, contact BYU-Pathway Support

Looking Ahead

Potential Employment

When seeking employment within the field of family studies and human services these search terms may be helpful.

Social and human service assistant
Juvenile services
Childcare worker/teacher
Psychiatric technician
Case aide

Or, search for jobs requiring the skills obtained, such as writing, problem solving, and persuasive speaking.

Why choose this certificate?

The advanced marriage and family functioning certificate emphasizes the development of employable skills, such as professional writing, problem-solving, synthesizing research, basic data analysis, and persuasive speaking and writing. These skills can help students obtain employment in a variety of interpersonal settings, such as human and family services. The advanced marriage and family functioning certificate will also provide students with a broad understanding of healthy marital and family functioning.

BYU-Pathway has found that certain combinations of certificates lead to better job opportunities. Most degrees have a recommended plan of certificates that will help students increase their income and improve their employment possibilities.