Dan River Region child care centers to go through rating process

Selecting a child care center in the Dan River Region may get a little easier within the next year as the area will have its first formal rating system put in place.

“I personally would like to live in a state where all child care centers are rated for quality,” said Ann Stratton the director of Danville Pittsylvania Smart Beginnings. “Parents need to know.”

Smart Beginnings, an organization designed to support children before age 5, is sponsoring local efforts for the Virginia Star Quality Initiative which give a one to five star rating for participating child care centers. Nine centers in Danville and Pittsylvania County are undergoing the rating system.

Virginia has participated in state-funded pilot programs to rate child care centers before, but not in this area. In other states, like North Carolina, child care centers must be rated three stars or higher to receive child care subsidies.

The Smart Beginnings in Hampton Roads self-funds its rating process and also keeps it going. The Smart Beginnings in Danville hopes to do the same.

“We want to see a majority at three and four stars,” said Stratton. She said the rating system is a lot like how hotels are rated. Five star ratings will be rare.

The rating process will include having a professional visit the child care center and check for quality of the staff, the instruction and environmental matters. Each center participating will receive a mentor who will work with them for months to help improve the center.

However, Stratton emphasizes the Smart Beginnings rating system is not designed to be a “gotcha” type of program going after child care centers and shutting them down. She said that the organization will work with the child care centers to get them in top shape.

“We are not in there to attack the child care centers, but we are there to help them get better,” said Stratton. “We know they care about children … we are all in this together.”

Michelle Hand, the director of the Danville Regional Medical Center’s child care service, was pleased with the rating system being put in place. The child care center at DRMC is the only corporate child care center in Danville and serves about 85 children in the community.

“The message [the rating system] is sending is that we are committed to quality child care and we are going over and beyond what is required,” said Hand.

She said one of the major concerns is that there is not a lot of money made in child care and when the quality improves the funding goes down. So many people wanting to provide quality childcare as a small business could easily struggle financially.

Smart Beginnings has already started a “pre-rating” strategy to prepare the child care centers how the rating works. They will begin the formal rating with published results this spring.

Stratton and other child care workers hope that the rating system will help improve local centers which would lead to many better-rounded students by the time they enter grade school.

Participants

Pilot participants include Pittsylvania County Head Start, Little Blessings Childcare, Small World Childcare Center, Children First Learning Center, Danville Regional Medical Center Child Care Center, Tot Spot (Clarkson St.), Danville City Head Start, Play-N-Pretend Child Care Center and Faith Christian Academy Early Childhood Development Center.