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Unregistered 07:25 AM 06-03-2011
Originally Posted by Meeko60:
So you are suggesting he take his child to a place where strangers are allowed to hang around? I am a day care provider. Have been for 25 years. For the safety of the children I NEVER allow strangers into my home and allow them near the children. As a parent of four children, I would never WANT my children to go to a place where their security was so bad.

I used to allow it. One day we found out that the father of one of our little day care girls was a convicted child rapist who had done time in another state. He liked to come and "observe" (yeah right) as you recommend. He seemed like a nice guy at first...business suit, friendly etc. Nobody will ever "observe" again. The parents of the children I have in my care are very grateful that I don't allow complete strangers to come in and be near their children. They are free to come and spend time with THEIR child any time they like. But they are never allowed around other people's kids. There is no need for them to be.

I wish people would stop pushing the "go and watch" thing. If your supervisor at work spent the day staring at you, would you put a foot wrong? Of course not. You probably wouldn't even pop a piece a gum in your mouth as you worked for fear of being accused of slacking off. Doesn't mean you won't spend the work day on facebook when the supervisor is away.

Spending a day with a day care provider is no different. What if she is a horrible person and abuses the kids.....do you think she'd do it in front of you?! Of course not! She will be on her best behavior! Mary Poppins in person!

Parents should check with licensing, ask for references of present and past clients and then watch their kids. Do they come home happy? Do they have friends? Do they talk about day care as if they enjoy it? These are REAL indicators of what the facility is like.

I know I am waaaay off topic here....but I am tired of the scaremongering that gets done to parents. Not all day care providers are satan personified.
I respect your opinion. You have a very good case as to why you don't allow it if what you're saying is true. Obviously, tours cannot require a background check before touring, but none of the home daycares or centers around my area perform a background check on customers - in my State, they legally have to reveal if a background check is required, because you have to submit to it in writing. So unless you have a lot of personal information on the person, there's no way you'd know anyway. And tours are generally limited to a 1-2 times anyway - there should have been red flags when this guy didn't have children with him and wanted to tour repeatedly - something doesn't check out with your story at all. If he was convicted, regardless of state, I can guarantee you in every state that he wouldn't be allowed to have any unsupervised visitation with his kids and him showing up without a kid is suspicious to begin with. However, not touring is not an option for centers. Maybe small home daycares can get away with this, but centers could never get away with this. In general, if you polled clients (not providers), I think you'd see that your policy is the minority, not the majority - customers want to tour and see how things are ran during business hours. It's very easy to see if they cannot handle a roudy child or if the teacher is mean or doesn't interact with the children. And every child care web site is wrong then? There are people from state licensing, doctors, providers, etc, etc - all experts in child care - that recommend touring during business hours. I guess if you consider potential clients strangers, that's your opinion - as a customer, I would expect that customers get to tour and will be around my children. Obviously, a teacher is supervising and the tour is limited - it's not an all day thing at all. And your story doesn't check out that you don't allow parents to be around other people's kids - it's 100% guarantee that they'll be around other people's kids when they come to see their kid during the day or for any special events you hold. One of the biggest things wrong with child care is that there aren't enough compliance checks done - I wish they were done every week, not twice per year. You know the saying, "While the cat's away, the mice will play." By what you're saying is that you're good to the kids while parents are there, but completely different when they're not - I would check yourself. I think everyone in every field should be supervised more closely. References from exisiting parents won't work - the provider will only provide references of those who are happy there, never about those that weren't. And existing parents won't say anything negative either for fear that they'll get termed. Maybe not all providers are satan personified, but neither are centers - one thing you can't get in a home based is the checks and balances that come with a center - there's always multiple teachers in the rooms as witnesses to what's going on and can check another teacher and report things. Home centers can just cover things up. I've read most of the threads on here and I can say that I would never choose a home based based on the things that are said here. At least most centers have 2 adult teachers in each classroom which makes things much safer for adult coverage. After all, all the home based have to leave the kids unsupervised in order to use the restroom. As a parent, that makes me cringe to think what can and will happen in that 2 minutes.
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