Home » ExchangeEveryDay » Do You CARE?



ExchangeEveryDay Past Issues


<< Previous Issue | View Past Issues | | Next Issue >> ExchangeEveryDay
Do You CARE?
May 17, 2010
Don't underestimate the power of love you communicate by allowing each child to decide when and how they want to play.
-AnjiPlay
In his management column in Exchange, "Good management begins with good people," Dennis Vicars often shares practices that yielded results when he was managing child care centers.  In the May 2010 issue of Exchange, Dennis described his CARE (Customer Attention Retains Enrollment) program by telling a story....

"In our story, enrollment was coming in the front door and disenrollment... was going out the back door.  Upon examining the numbers, the story became obvious:  the children were fine, but the parents were not.  Through further research, I came to realize that 50% of disenrollment was taking place in the first 90 days.  Additionally, those families who remained after the first 90 days stayed enrolled on average over the next 24 months.

"The conclusion was obvious:  the parents, especially new parents, need attention as well as reminders that they made a good decision for their child by enrolling in our program.  Overcoming the new parent's guilt or the reluctant parent's parting with their child for his or her first early care and education experience can be daunting, but a challenge that can be mitigated through CARE.

"CARE, for my operation, is a systematic way to make sure that the director, teacher, and staff are in daily contact with the new parent.  The key to starting a CARE program is to make sure you have planned a daily/weekly device for reaching the parent and that your system is simple, easily executed, and performed by a designated person(s) within the organization.  Remember, the goal is to reduce parent anxiety within the first 90 days of enrollment so they begin to enjoy and celebrate the quality of the program that their child is experiencing on a daily basis."



Many past issues of Exchange, including the May/June 2010 issue referred to above, loaded with management and educational ideas, are still available.  Each issue includes over 20 practical articles dealing with challenges you face every day in running an early childhood organization.  And, this week, all Exchange Back Issues are available at a 20% discount.

ExchangeEveryDay

Delivered five days a week containing news, success stories, solutions, trend reports, and much more.

What is ExchangeEveryDay?

ExchangeEveryDay is the official electronic newsletter for Exchange Press. It is delivered five days a week containing news stories, success stories, solutions, trend reports, and much more.

Coverall Health-Based Commercial Cleaning gives your facility the safest, most sanitary care. No wonder nearly 50,000 companies, including many of the Fortune 500, trust our innovative methods to provide a cleaner, healthier environment.




Comments (2)

Displaying All 2 Comments
Jackie Hamilton · May 19, 2010
KEET-TV (PBS)
Fortuna, CA, United States


On a child's first day of attendance at centers I directed, I always
gave the parent a pretty little separation anxiety "care kit." There
were items such as a mirror so they could check to make sure they were leaving the child with a smile, tissues for the tears of pride and joy, aspirin
for the guilt headache, chocolate kisses so they knew we would be
giving their child lots of love, and my business card in case they
wanted to call.

At the end of the day we made sure the parent had lots of pictures of
the child having fun at their new school.

Jackie Hamilton
KEET-TV Ready To Learn Educator

Bill Strader · May 17, 2010
Hesser College
Manchester, New Hampshire, United States


In the centers that I was responsible for, as a former director, I always made sure that my best "Parent communicators? were my "opening staff" and "closing staff" Thus effective parent and family connections were always a key component to our programs.



Post a Comment

Have an account? to submit your comment.


required

Your e-mail address will not be visible to other website visitors.
required
required
required

Check the box below, to help verify that you are not a bot. Doing so helps prevent automated programs from abusing this form.



Disclaimer: Exchange reserves the right to remove any comments at its discretion or reprint posted comments in other Exchange materials.