Parents, like teachers and schools, serve as a main agent of socialization, and parents have a significant impact on their child’s use of substances. Parental attitudes about children’s alcohol use have been shown to impact children’s future use. Likewise, parental monitoring and positive parent-child relationships in childhood act as protective factors for later substance use. Because substance use is inextricably linked with genetics and the family context, it is important for prevention efforts to expand beyond children learning in the classroom to a multi-component approach that includes parents. Parents can reduce a child’s risk of substance use through several avenues, including but not limited to: monitoring of behaviors, positive attitudes and self-efficacy for discussing substances, establishing positive norms and expectations about substance use, and by providing positive modeling and reinforcement of behaviors. When all is considered, prevention efforts should target children and parents universally and should occur both before and during adolescence.