Building Impact Through Government Partnerships: the Naungan Kasih Positive Parenting Program in Malaysia

Naungan Kasih (NK) is a hybrid positive parenting program for parents and caregivers of preschool-aged children that blends digital, in-person, and remote support to strengthen parenting skills and promote children's healthy development. This paper documents the development, evaluation, and scaling pathways in which academic institutions, Malaysian government agencies, and international organizations collaborated as a consortium to translate evidence-based parenting principles into a locally feasible, culturally responsive delivery model. NK progressed through a three-phase implementation journey. It began by strengthening and standardizing in-person parenting support in response to a government request, then shifted to digital delivery during COVID-19 through ParentText and ParentChat, and is currently focused on embedding hybrid NK within the government preschool platform to support scalable, sustainable delivery. The development process involved formative assessment, co-design, and pilot testing of the program. NK is being tested through a cluster-randomized controlled trial with effectiveness outcomes including caregiver parenting practices, mental health, and relationship quality, as well as child developmental and behavioral outcomes, alongside process measures of reach and engagement. The scaling pathway leverages evaluation outputs by building a train-the-trainer system, supervision and quality-assurance mechanisms, standardized monitoring for continuous improvement, a technology-transfer process, and modular materials that can be adapted across local contexts without diluting core components. The NK collaboration framework demonstrates how a multi-stakeholder partnership can produce an evidence-informed, implementation-ready intervention, while simultaneously establishing the operational infrastructure required for rigorous evaluation and scalable delivery within government agencies.