Cindy Winther and Roxann Ewald, both Oxford child care providers, have worked hard to be two of the only 10 providers in Oakland County to achieve national standards of quality through the National Association for Family Child Care (NAFCC) Accreditation this year.
“It was quite a process to go through,” said Winther, who runs Sunny Day Preschool from her home. “There was a lot of work and time involved.”
In order to apply for accreditation, child care providers must complete a self-analysis workbook; provide documentation of statements made in the workbook; hand out parent surveys, which are returned anonymously; attend monthly meetings and undergo a day of observation. In addition, they must update their programs and make any necessary improvements.
Winther, who opened her preschool in 1989, said she began the accreditation process in September of 2001. On top of the many items listed above, she also had to go back to school and earn 90 credit hours in early childhood education.
Ewald, who has been running her daycare for seven years, began working on the application in the spring of 2002. She already had her course work and was really looking for some direction in fine tuning her program.
“I just figured I’d been doing this for years, and if I’m not doing it right now, somebody needs to tell me,” she explained.
Both women worked on their applications with the assistance of the Oakland County Child Care Council. In addition to offering support and suggestions throughout the process, the council also provided the two Oxford women with $3,000 grants to pay for the cost of the application and any needed materials or improvements for their programs.
“They explained they were going to pay for it and help with the grant money,” said Ewald. “How could I not do it?”
The grant funding was provided by the Skillman Foundation. The purpose was to increase the quality of care being provided to children and families throughout the seven northern communities of Oakland County.
Winther’s Sunny Day Preschool offers a unique preschool environment with creative and developmentally correct activities for children ages two and a half up to five. She teaches three classes with up to 12 students each and has the aid of assistant teacher Debra Lindsay. Her grant money was used to paint the preschool rooms, add new shelving and build a wooden fence in the backyard.
Ewald watches six children total, including two of her own, at the Tomorrow’s Treasures Daycare. She used her grant monies to purchase a new changing table, new storage shelving with clear plastic bins, a dramatic play closet for the children’s dress-up clothes, books and teaching tools, and a new play structure with landscaping.
When considering accreditation, the NAFCC looks for high standards of quality in the following areas: relationships with children and families, environment and materials, activities, developmental learning goals, safety and health, and professional business practices. Both Oxford providers rated high in all of these areas. In Oxford, there are 29 home daycare providers and only three, including Winther and Ewald, are nationally accredited.
“It’s a good feeling to know your doing well,” said Winther. “It was a lot of work, but I feel self-evaluation is a good thing to do.”
“It was nice to have somebody tell me what I was doing was good,” Ewald said. She continued to add that her next goal is very simple – she plans on enjoying what she’s doing.
“Now that I’ve got this, what else is there,” she laughed.
Winther plans on taking the education she began for the accreditation process a step further. She is continuing to take college courses and may even teach a little in early childhood at the college level.
“I’m not sure where I’ll go with it yet,” she explained, “but I’m always looking for new ways to challenge myself.”
For more information on choosing quality chid care or the NAFCC Accreditation, please call 1-800-4CHILDCARE.