Child care dilemma

[bunnymendelbaum]

What is the other place like? Better menu? Facility?

[Deleted]

Childcare is so hard.
I would change though I think. You and the kid don't seem all that thrilled where you are. Pickups and drop-offs don't bother me though. I do them 99% of the time and my daycare is 2 miles from my house..lol. It's NBD to me.

Also, I don't find 15 minutes that far. For some perspective, it takes me 15 minutes to locate a gas station or reach the grocery store.

[Deleted]

Childcare is so hard.
I would change though I think. You and the kid don't seem all that thrilled where you are. Pickups and drop-offs don't bother me though. I do them 99% of the time and my daycare is 2 miles from my house..lol. It's NBD to me.

Also, I don't find 15 minutes that far. For some perspective, it takes me 15 minutes to locate a gas station or reach the grocery store.

[sailorgray]

If you think your DS would transition well, I would switch to the new place. Definitely.

[demandypants]

I helped convince my friend to stay at her current center in a similar scenario, but she was totally content with the center. And it worked for her family in all kinds of ways. So she passed on the sought after spot at the other center she was waitlisted on. However, it doesn't sound like it is the same in your situation. If the other center solves your complaints of the current one I would deal with the commute changes.

[ktzmoh]

Ug childcare is responsible for 75% of my gray hair! I can't wait for the day when I don't have to worry about it anymore.

How's the quality at the campus place? Sometimes i find campus places to be very good because they like to keep the families of faculty members happy and they may be affiliated with an early childhood learning program or something. Sometimes though they are not so great because they are an afterthought to the main functions of the university.

Do you ever have to travel for work? Do you ever have to have late meetings/ classes? How hard would it be for H to pick up if something came up (even if it wouldn't be a regular thing)? For me, one of the big factors for switching around our childcare arrangements was to make it such that I didn't have to do all the drop offs and pick ups. It basically meant I could never travel for work, never schedule late meetings, never be on late calls etc... It's been much better for us to have a little flexibility in who picks up.

How about cost? Sometimes campus places are subsidized... that could be a perk too.

[sailorgray]

Hmmmm...it would really bother me that the teacher uses words like ain't. Kids pick up on that so easily. That alone would really bother me. Have you thought about saying something to the director? I Know it sounds so petty, but if I heard DS potential teachers speaking that way on a tour, we would never have chosen that one.

[SusanBAnthony]

I would switch.

Our daycare that DS was in before I quit to sah, had a kind of similar toddler teacher. I had loved the baby teachers, and the toddler one was very sweet and had the patience of one thousand suns. Which you need to take care of six toddlers all day long, kill me now. But, she was honestly dumb as a brick. It was so hard to ask her questions or talk to her about how Ds's day went because she was just.so.dumb. It wasn't enough to make me change centers since I loved everything else about it. Bt in your situation, with a closer center that is maybe better, I would totally switch.

My cousin works at the on campus daycare at her university (she is an early childhood Ed major). The good thing is she is super excited and loves kids and gives them lots of attention, etc. the bad thing is that there is one or two main teachers in each room, and the rest are a revolving door of students who work part time. I would not want that for an infant- I think it is too important to have consistent caregivers that they can bond with. But for an older kid I think the energetic excited teachers would be a good thing.

[emoflamingo]

I had Monkey at a campus center when I was in school full-time. I liked that they were all early childhood ed majors and passionate about their work with the kids. They LOVED playing with them, teaching them, being with them. I'm actually FB friends with the director and his 2 favorite teachers still.

I think, and I know it's hard, I would try not to fret until you get the information from the other center. Then, once you have that, I would seriously look at whether or not the quality of care (Do the teachers stay long? Is the sample menu reflective of what is served daily? What kind of activities do you do with the kids?) is better than what you have now. If I were in your shoes, I would take it. I don't do pick up and drop off now, because my husband is off hours before I am, but to me it'd be worth it if the care would be better. I was driving 15 minutes to drop off my kiddo and then another 20 to work, so I get what you mean about having it seem like a lot of driving (I would leave my house by 8 a.m. to make sure I was at work by 9 a.m.), but sometimes it is worth it.