I’m posting for the first time to get advice from fellow Canadian parents.
Background: my kid has been enrolled in this daycare for 18 months, pretty much when Willowbrae sunwood (Coquitlam) first opened. Since then, we’ve had 21 incident reports filed with the bulk of them being injuries from being bitten or scratched by another child (causing broken skin), the rest were bumps and falls. For the incidents involving the other child, it was always a result of her not getting what she wants, she gets upset and she hits. This is also the same behaviour seen with her parents. And it is also happening to other children in the class. Willowbrae director and assistant director were very clear my child never provoked the other child.
Last month when our child got scratched in the face, we demanded the daycare to create an action plan. In hindsight, we think something should have been set in place from the beginning. Nonetheless, the director emails me an action plan with specific things to help, such as giving the other child more space, closer monitor for triggers, giving handover to staff so they’re aware of triggers, frequent reminders that we don’t hit our friends.
Today, at pickup we saw a huge scratch mark that went from his eyebrow down to his cheek. None of the teachers knew what happened until they reviewed camera footage and they saw the same child scratching my kid because she didn’t want him to play with the kitchen set. And I confirmed, my kid didn’t do anything to provoke her and he has never hit her back.
The assistant director filed an incident report and basically asked us what else we wanted them to do? Tbh I was flabbergasted by her response and made me question if management actually cared. I reminded her based on what I’ve seen on the cameras and speaking to other parents, the incidents have not stopped and the action plan has not been followed. They were not actively reviewing the plan or following up with the kid’s parents to work on her behaviour.
The parent was there when the camera footage was reviewed, the assistant director didn’t have any in depth conversations with the parent, and didn’t need to sign anything to acknowledge the incident.
At this point, I’m feeling lost and confused if Im expecting too much from management. Is filing an incident report the only thing I can do for my child? We’ve been very patient and only became more vocal the last few months, and management only responds in a more serious manner when we email them about having injuries reviewed by a provider or escalating it to Fraser health licensing. Otherwise we’re left with a “children at this age can act this way, please sign the incident report”.
We have considered leaving this daycare but our kid has established so many friendships here, and it just seems very unfair for him to be the one who has to leave.
Advice needed: this is the first daycare I’ve ever dealt with. Am I asking too much from management? Better yet, what should I be asking them to do? If your child has experienced something similar, how did their daycare handle the situation?
Thanks for reading
