KinderCare Learning Centers #000540

This place was TERRIBLE for our kids (son 3 1/2, daughter 2). I'd honestly give it zero stars if I could.

On the first day of school, the teacher in our son's room had NO IDEA a new student was enrolling. She made no attempt to acknowledge him or make him feel welcome into his new school. Instead he was left standing by himself without being introduced to any of the other children.

We brought the issue up to the director, Jackie Cause. Who told us emphatically that this is not how this are supposed to be, and that they had a few people out the Friday prior, causing a gap in communication. Unfortunately, having a few people out became to "go to" excuse.

Soon thereafter, we starting having issues with our daughter's care. We noticed over and over again that the child to teacher ratios were not being upheld. I even brought the issue up to Jackie, the director, and her excuse was, "Oh? Did a few families just show up?". It was 8 O'clock in the morning, when all of the parents normally show up.

The under-staffing soon resulting in poor care for our daughter. The first issue we noticed was that our daughter had a soiled diaper nearly every time we picked her up. It was easily noticeable from how full her diaper looked and the smell. My wife was able to either spot it, or smell it, before we even checked. And most times, it had been there long enough to dry and cause a rash.

Next she was bitten so hard that the mark lasted for a few days. Having kids ourselves, we understand that this happens sometimes. However, our biggest issues was that we were not even called or informed. I happened to notice that bite as the care provider was changing my daughters diaper. It was only after I asked that she said, "Oh yeah, I think the other teacher has the incident report. I turns out that she was bit early in the morning and the mark was so red it looked like it had just happened.

A few days later the toddler room was supposed to have water play. But it was an unusually cold morning for the summer and when we arrived, the water play table for the toddlers was located in the shade, at 8 in the morning, and the temp was in the low 60s. We were kind of shocked that they were even letting the toddlers play, as some of them were shivering and asking for a towel. We told the teachers that we were NOT going to change our daughter into water clothes and that we did NOT want her to play because it was too cold. That afternoon when we picked her up she was in different clothes, because they let her play in the water in her day clothes.

The last straw was the following week. We picked up our daughter from Kindercare and brought her home, then we noticed that she had a 3-4 inch scratch going down the side of her neck and onto her chest. I called the Director, Jackie, and told her about what I had found. What made me even more furious was the fact that none of her teachers saw her get hurt, and none of them had noticed the scratch themselves. That means not only was she not being watched, she was not being paid attention to either.

We disenrolled them and moved them to Kiddie Country (which is fantastic!). But we had a SUBSTANTIAL pre-paid balance in our account. It has been over a month and a half since we left, and we just got an email stating that they will not be transferring the money, instead they will mail a paper check. Which will take another 6 WEEKS!

I tried to reach the District Director Danni Blake, numerous times, and have even left a message on her phone, but she has yet to return my call.

Even now we are having to deal with some behavioral issues that my son learned while he was at the Newington Forest Kindercare. This place is just a baby farm trying to make as much money as they can. Profit is the priority, not the children.