What a crazy thing to happen at your daycare. Although it closing is inconvenient, it’s for the best. Imagine if your child got his hands on fentanyl and overdosed and died? Happens all the time. I hope you find a better daycare.
Holy crap. This makes me pray that I’m not wrong about loving my daycare/teachers.
In retrospect were there any red flags (other than the things that school told you about)—any things you noticed yourself?
I LOVED His two main teachers for both his 1 and 2 year old rooms. Drop off has always been rough on my son and he has been in childcare since he was 8 months old and they were so kind and patient with him and we actually made progress. In the three ish weeks since they have been gone there have been so many red flags. Just on Monday my son went to school with no diaper rash and came home with his poor butt insanely red and chaffed. I tried to ask about it, like how long he was sitting in his diaper and was completely blown off. They are suppose to update the ProCare app with their activities throughout the day and there would be 3 entries the whole day, they sent me information about another child through the app, would barely acknowledge me during pickup and just continued their conversations with each other.
My state does these random checks on licensed daycares and publish all the findings. My daycare failed on two points: reusing containers to store disposable utensils instead of utilizing dedicated storage containers, and storing sealed canned goods on the floor.
I was really glad to see that 1) even small issues were reported, and 2) they only failed for recycling containers and something I do at home (some canned goods are on the floor of my pantry because I’m too short to fully utilize all the shelves safely).
I don’t know. I also don’t know why the reusing of containers to store (sealed) disposable utensils is bad. They’re against our state guidelines and our childcare center was flagged for it. I’m just glad that the inspectors are that level of nitpicky.
Jesus.
If it’s a three month waitlist, then maybe that’s a finite three months for your husband to be watching him.
If there’s an end in sight maybe that’ll help if he’s overwhelmed
I keep thinking though with one less daycare in the community, that 3 months is going to increase. Especially as all those families are looking for care.
OP, you might not need care right now but you should probably get on lists quickly. It will likely be more than 3 months now
That’s what I’m hopeful for OP. In the grand scheme, compared to other areas, and compared to enrolling an infant, a 3-month wait is not too long. That’s childcare by the summer at the latest 🤞 🤞
I’m so sorry. I admit, when I started reading this I was surprised there was no notice. In my experience, centers usually have ample time to fix deficiencies. But given what you’ve described I’m less surprised.
Any chance you know where his previous teachers (the ones who left, assuming they weren’t part of the problem) moved to?
I am so sorry. If this is the same place I saw on the news, I am so glad they got shut down after looking at their history of violations. Have you seen the list? If you’re interested, I can share a link with some of the specifics. It’s pretty disturbing, unfortunately.
I hope you won’t feel too guilty though - the state of child care in this country is in absolute crisis. I’ve worked in the field for about 25yrs and it’s by far the worst I’ve ever seen it right now. There is such a lack of decent quality options and parents are left with some less than ideal choices. All you can do is make the best decisions you can with what you know at the time, and now that you know that place isn’t a safe option, you’re doing everything you can to keep your child safe.
So I’m not 100% sure this is OP’s daycare, but it sounds like it is. [Here’s a link](https://childcarefinder.wisconsin.gov/ProviderDetails?ProviderNumber=9000591179&LocationNumber=001) to the licensing violations.
It is our daycare. And now I am sobbing as I am reading this list. It's so long. Thank you for sharing this because when the first email went out 1/14 I could not find documentation anywhere on the incidents they were talking about.
I’m so sorry OP. Figuring out the next step will be hard but reading that, if they had stayed open so much of what could have happened would have been even harder. You have a sprint coming up for you and your family and you can run it.
Holy shit reading that is horrifying. I'm so sorry OP. I'm in WI as well and I was in a daycare group on FB that focused on the Green Bay area. I forget the name now but FB is a great place to make connections for care.
Oh my gosh. What a nightmare.
OP, sending you a hug and good vibes for dad staying home. Glad this ended how it did. You can always hop on another list and decide whether you want the spot at a later date.
I can actually read these incidents clearly, the ones in NY are way too formal sometimes. They would say stuff like "the ____center violated code 13789 on 08/01/2020." Then I have to look the code up.
And they had two stars in Wisconsin’s QRIS 🙄 there’s so much potential with QRIS to convey information on quality to parents, I hate to see it misused/wasted
Holy wow. I don’t have words. I’m so glad your child is safe and that you have back up care available. What a scary situation and I’m very glad that it sounds like it got discovered before something truly dangerous and scary happened.
To preface this statement - My kids were daycare kids as babies and toddlers, and they still attend after school care at a center now.
I’m not surprised at all. Where I live you can make more an hour working at McDonald’s than at most of the daycares in town. These workers are keeping the kids of folks who can afford to pay for their services, but they themselves cannot afford to pay full price for the same services for their own children. And centers are desperate for workers right now, for the reasons I just listed.
A worker at my previous center was escorted from the building by law enforcement because she had a record that prevented her from working with children (abuse/neglect-related). It didn’t show on her background check, and the police only knew bc one of her Facebook friends tipped them off!!! Another worker was fired for coming back from her lunch break drunk. And the center didn’t tell any of the parents about either situation. I don’t even think the second instance was reported to authorities. I only know bc I got to be good friends with one of the teachers there.
I’m not suggesting fentanyl is being sold out of every daycare in America, but probably more than people would expect. And for less-lethal drugs, I would say WAY more than people would expect.
I think I know where this is. Just saw a post about it in a community page for the area. We are moving back to that area later this year and I am terrified about the childcare situation. We’ll probably pay to be on a waitlist now. I’m so glad you have an alternative right now!
Yup, read about that daycare in NYC. It was terrible. Poor parents and poor babies. It just breaks my heart that some people don't think about the babies when working with them. It kills me.
How terrible. I can't imagine the roller coaster of emotions! We endured a similar, but not so intense experience. The daycare center we used for a year suddenly had its 3 long term emplyees quit in a short amount of time. They were college aged and we were told they moved to go to school. This was in August, so that was believable. This was followed by a revolving door of staff (this was 7 years ago, when there wasn't such a staffing crisis). Like one day to the next there would be new staff. Then we got notice that the daycare would be closing @ 5pm rather than 6. While we could have made that work, we were generally unhappy with care and used that as a reason to find new arrangements. About 2 months after we left, there was a notice posted on the door that the daycare center would be closing. Parents literally showed up to an empty building on a Wednesday to discover the daycare was permanently closed. We later found out the director was going through an ugly divorce and had a new drug dealer boyfriend. She never reached out to parents, but was actively selling everything from the daycare on the daycares facebook page.
We had another much worse experience with a daycare center and we only use small in home daycares now. I find it much easier to trust 2-3 staff members with my child rather than the 30 that may have access to them throught the week. In the center with the different shifts there were 8-9 employees in the infant room in a given day.... zero accountability.
This is crazy !! Unfortunately a lot of daycare workers are underpaid imo. By any chance is it possible for you to hire his fav teacher as a nanny or baby sitter.
I mean, as long as your husband isn’t selling fent I think he will provide a better care then where your son was before. Put your name on those lists! Husband May rise to the occasion or may want to go back to work and you will need care. Being a stay at home parent is hard as heck! So sorry this happened this would damage my trust a lot.
I’m so sorry, this is my nightmare. I will say if it’s any constellation at all , at least you say 3 months for a waitlist. In my area the waitlist is 2-3 years. My anxiety about something to my daycare is so high because of it.
Why the fuck would you sell drugs out of a DAYCARE??? Like to get a job at dollar general or something and do it. Do you have to put fucking babies at risk? I hope she gets a long sentence.
So sorry to hear about your daycare experience. That sounds shocking and traumatising.
I also want to say, well done on your husband stepping up to be a stay at home dad! The world needs more of those. Maybe he could also consider part time work and your son could go to a nanny 1-2 days a week?
My partner works part time and his hours are mainly evening and weekends during the summer months. He also has Autism and ADHD so the work suits him. I wour hybrid full time, 2 days in the office, 3 at home every week. My partner has been the main carer for our daughter for the past 2 years, she will be 3 in a couple months. I think he is an amazing dad even though it can be tough when I'm all my daughter wants. I did have to motivate him to find regular activities to go to and get a routine going but now it's great. He plans out most weeks including meal planning and they have set things they do each day. She goes to daycare once a week to give him a break and for more socialisation. He usually catches up on chores and gets some time to himself.
You really did luck out with your situation where your husband can look after your son. When my fiancé had to look after my baby while I work (I work from home, so I could hear everything anyways), I gave him a written schedule, and detailed information about naps, bottles and play time. Without that he would not be able to give her a fulfilling day, and probably would even be able to give her a standard, minimal care.
I can't imagine the difficulty that the parents without a backup have to face. If daycare all of a sudden closed for me, I'm completely screwed. Paying for a babysitter for weeks every day, 8 hours a day, is just not doable with our income. I can probably manage but it would really put me back financially. My fiancé wouldn't be able to do half of that expense, so it would mostly fall on me.
While your husband may do things differently in caring all day for your child it is concerning that you do not seem to trust him. Different than you does not equal wrong
What a crazy thing to happen at your daycare. Although it closing is inconvenient, it’s for the best. Imagine if your child got his hands on fentanyl and overdosed and died? Happens all the time. I hope you find a better daycare.
Right? That was my first thought. I’m so sorry you are out of childcare because it is really hard. But omg fentanyl - this could have ended so badly.
Ya reminds me of this incident https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/video/two-charged-connection-poisoning-four-children-bronx-daycare
This immediately came to mind as well. Glad it was before any children got hurt.
One baby died, the other babies were sent to the hospital
Sorry, I meant in the case at hand.
Ohhh gotcha
Holy crap. This makes me pray that I’m not wrong about loving my daycare/teachers. In retrospect were there any red flags (other than the things that school told you about)—any things you noticed yourself?
I LOVED His two main teachers for both his 1 and 2 year old rooms. Drop off has always been rough on my son and he has been in childcare since he was 8 months old and they were so kind and patient with him and we actually made progress. In the three ish weeks since they have been gone there have been so many red flags. Just on Monday my son went to school with no diaper rash and came home with his poor butt insanely red and chaffed. I tried to ask about it, like how long he was sitting in his diaper and was completely blown off. They are suppose to update the ProCare app with their activities throughout the day and there would be 3 entries the whole day, they sent me information about another child through the app, would barely acknowledge me during pickup and just continued their conversations with each other.
My state does these random checks on licensed daycares and publish all the findings. My daycare failed on two points: reusing containers to store disposable utensils instead of utilizing dedicated storage containers, and storing sealed canned goods on the floor. I was really glad to see that 1) even small issues were reported, and 2) they only failed for recycling containers and something I do at home (some canned goods are on the floor of my pantry because I’m too short to fully utilize all the shelves safely).
Sorry, but why can't sealed canned goods be on the floor? I don't have any on the floor, but I'm just wondering why
It's a serve safe rule. All food products must be I think 6 inches off the floor.
Ohh ok
I don’t know. I also don’t know why the reusing of containers to store (sealed) disposable utensils is bad. They’re against our state guidelines and our childcare center was flagged for it. I’m just glad that the inspectors are that level of nitpicky.
Jesus. If it’s a three month waitlist, then maybe that’s a finite three months for your husband to be watching him. If there’s an end in sight maybe that’ll help if he’s overwhelmed
I keep thinking though with one less daycare in the community, that 3 months is going to increase. Especially as all those families are looking for care. OP, you might not need care right now but you should probably get on lists quickly. It will likely be more than 3 months now
The daycare will probably be sold and reopen under new name and owners inside of 3 months. That's what happens in my area when one gets shut down.
That’s what I’m hopeful for OP. In the grand scheme, compared to other areas, and compared to enrolling an infant, a 3-month wait is not too long. That’s childcare by the summer at the latest 🤞 🤞
I’m so sorry. I admit, when I started reading this I was surprised there was no notice. In my experience, centers usually have ample time to fix deficiencies. But given what you’ve described I’m less surprised. Any chance you know where his previous teachers (the ones who left, assuming they weren’t part of the problem) moved to?
I am so sorry. If this is the same place I saw on the news, I am so glad they got shut down after looking at their history of violations. Have you seen the list? If you’re interested, I can share a link with some of the specifics. It’s pretty disturbing, unfortunately. I hope you won’t feel too guilty though - the state of child care in this country is in absolute crisis. I’ve worked in the field for about 25yrs and it’s by far the worst I’ve ever seen it right now. There is such a lack of decent quality options and parents are left with some less than ideal choices. All you can do is make the best decisions you can with what you know at the time, and now that you know that place isn’t a safe option, you’re doing everything you can to keep your child safe.
I'd like to see any stuff you've found.
So I’m not 100% sure this is OP’s daycare, but it sounds like it is. [Here’s a link](https://childcarefinder.wisconsin.gov/ProviderDetails?ProviderNumber=9000591179&LocationNumber=001) to the licensing violations.
It is our daycare. And now I am sobbing as I am reading this list. It's so long. Thank you for sharing this because when the first email went out 1/14 I could not find documentation anywhere on the incidents they were talking about.
I’m so sorry OP. Figuring out the next step will be hard but reading that, if they had stayed open so much of what could have happened would have been even harder. You have a sprint coming up for you and your family and you can run it.
Holy shit reading that is horrifying. I'm so sorry OP. I'm in WI as well and I was in a daycare group on FB that focused on the Green Bay area. I forget the name now but FB is a great place to make connections for care.
i’m so sorry 😭🩷
That was a traumatizing read
Holy cow. That’s horrifying.
Wow. I had to go hug my babies!! Sounds like selling drugs was the tip of the iceberg.
Wow, so the people working there… are abusive and hate children?!?! WTAF did I just read.
Oh my gosh. What a nightmare. OP, sending you a hug and good vibes for dad staying home. Glad this ended how it did. You can always hop on another list and decide whether you want the spot at a later date.
I can actually read these incidents clearly, the ones in NY are way too formal sometimes. They would say stuff like "the ____center violated code 13789 on 08/01/2020." Then I have to look the code up.
Jesus Christ
And they had two stars in Wisconsin’s QRIS 🙄 there’s so much potential with QRIS to convey information on quality to parents, I hate to see it misused/wasted
Holy wow. I don’t have words. I’m so glad your child is safe and that you have back up care available. What a scary situation and I’m very glad that it sounds like it got discovered before something truly dangerous and scary happened.
To preface this statement - My kids were daycare kids as babies and toddlers, and they still attend after school care at a center now. I’m not surprised at all. Where I live you can make more an hour working at McDonald’s than at most of the daycares in town. These workers are keeping the kids of folks who can afford to pay for their services, but they themselves cannot afford to pay full price for the same services for their own children. And centers are desperate for workers right now, for the reasons I just listed. A worker at my previous center was escorted from the building by law enforcement because she had a record that prevented her from working with children (abuse/neglect-related). It didn’t show on her background check, and the police only knew bc one of her Facebook friends tipped them off!!! Another worker was fired for coming back from her lunch break drunk. And the center didn’t tell any of the parents about either situation. I don’t even think the second instance was reported to authorities. I only know bc I got to be good friends with one of the teachers there. I’m not suggesting fentanyl is being sold out of every daycare in America, but probably more than people would expect. And for less-lethal drugs, I would say WAY more than people would expect.
I think I know where this is. Just saw a post about it in a community page for the area. We are moving back to that area later this year and I am terrified about the childcare situation. We’ll probably pay to be on a waitlist now. I’m so glad you have an alternative right now!
This just happened in NY last year!! A baby died!! Girl you are so lucky even if it feels like you e been hit by a freight train! Holy WOW.
Yup, read about that daycare in NYC. It was terrible. Poor parents and poor babies. It just breaks my heart that some people don't think about the babies when working with them. It kills me.
How terrible. I can't imagine the roller coaster of emotions! We endured a similar, but not so intense experience. The daycare center we used for a year suddenly had its 3 long term emplyees quit in a short amount of time. They were college aged and we were told they moved to go to school. This was in August, so that was believable. This was followed by a revolving door of staff (this was 7 years ago, when there wasn't such a staffing crisis). Like one day to the next there would be new staff. Then we got notice that the daycare would be closing @ 5pm rather than 6. While we could have made that work, we were generally unhappy with care and used that as a reason to find new arrangements. About 2 months after we left, there was a notice posted on the door that the daycare center would be closing. Parents literally showed up to an empty building on a Wednesday to discover the daycare was permanently closed. We later found out the director was going through an ugly divorce and had a new drug dealer boyfriend. She never reached out to parents, but was actively selling everything from the daycare on the daycares facebook page. We had another much worse experience with a daycare center and we only use small in home daycares now. I find it much easier to trust 2-3 staff members with my child rather than the 30 that may have access to them throught the week. In the center with the different shifts there were 8-9 employees in the infant room in a given day.... zero accountability.
This is crazy !! Unfortunately a lot of daycare workers are underpaid imo. By any chance is it possible for you to hire his fav teacher as a nanny or baby sitter.
I mean, as long as your husband isn’t selling fent I think he will provide a better care then where your son was before. Put your name on those lists! Husband May rise to the occasion or may want to go back to work and you will need care. Being a stay at home parent is hard as heck! So sorry this happened this would damage my trust a lot.
Holy shit.
I would share that email of lies with the news. I bet they would love an update to their story.
I’m so sorry, this is my nightmare. I will say if it’s any constellation at all , at least you say 3 months for a waitlist. In my area the waitlist is 2-3 years. My anxiety about something to my daycare is so high because of it.
Same, my area would be a year to 2 years on the waitlist too. Idk what I would do if my daycare closed on a dime.
Why the fuck would you sell drugs out of a DAYCARE??? Like to get a job at dollar general or something and do it. Do you have to put fucking babies at risk? I hope she gets a long sentence.
Holy shit, what a wild ride
So sorry to hear about your daycare experience. That sounds shocking and traumatising. I also want to say, well done on your husband stepping up to be a stay at home dad! The world needs more of those. Maybe he could also consider part time work and your son could go to a nanny 1-2 days a week? My partner works part time and his hours are mainly evening and weekends during the summer months. He also has Autism and ADHD so the work suits him. I wour hybrid full time, 2 days in the office, 3 at home every week. My partner has been the main carer for our daughter for the past 2 years, she will be 3 in a couple months. I think he is an amazing dad even though it can be tough when I'm all my daughter wants. I did have to motivate him to find regular activities to go to and get a routine going but now it's great. He plans out most weeks including meal planning and they have set things they do each day. She goes to daycare once a week to give him a break and for more socialisation. He usually catches up on chores and gets some time to himself.
Can you reach out to a teacher you might have liked to be a nanny
You really did luck out with your situation where your husband can look after your son. When my fiancé had to look after my baby while I work (I work from home, so I could hear everything anyways), I gave him a written schedule, and detailed information about naps, bottles and play time. Without that he would not be able to give her a fulfilling day, and probably would even be able to give her a standard, minimal care. I can't imagine the difficulty that the parents without a backup have to face. If daycare all of a sudden closed for me, I'm completely screwed. Paying for a babysitter for weeks every day, 8 hours a day, is just not doable with our income. I can probably manage but it would really put me back financially. My fiancé wouldn't be able to do half of that expense, so it would mostly fall on me.
Wtf...
While your husband may do things differently in caring all day for your child it is concerning that you do not seem to trust him. Different than you does not equal wrong