This report summarizes the final evaluation of the Parental Empowerment Program: an experimental program building on family strengths and local resources which was offered for an average of 24 months to 160 families in 10 Syracuse (New York) neighborhoods. Chapter 1 provides a conceptual overview, a program description, and a methodological summary. Chapter 2 reports effects of the empowerment program on several school outcomes, on home-school communication, and on joint activities of parents and children. Chapter 3 explores additional effects, including the influence of perception of self as parent on parent-child activities, the influence of perceptions on the child's school performance, mother-child activities and performance in school, social networks and perceptions of self as parent, social networks and mother-child activities, personal social networks and school outcomes, parental self-perceptions and home-school communications. Chapter 4 discusses the range and complexity of program impact in terms of the following topics: (1) whether the program affected children by influencing the natural ecologies of their families; (2) whether effects on child behavior can be detected and how they are causally linked; (3) how effects and processes vary for different subgroups; (4) family support as relief from stress; (5) the utility of process variables; (6) social supports as measures of program impact; (7) the reality of the empowerment process; and (8) challenging issues in the relationship between families and formal schooling. (RH)