Yikes! Oregon Fails Kids
Kristin Teigen
The National Association of Child Care Resources & Referral Agencies (NACCRRA) (they really need a shorter name) recently issued two reports on the status of state regulations that aim to ensure quality and safety for child care environments. How did Oregon do? Parents, brace yourselves. Oregon’s child care centers received 64 out of 150.
But hey, those are just those large centers right? What about the cozy homes that some parents bring their kids to? We thought we were choosing the best option when we sent our children to the home of a mother who had over twenty years of experience in changing diapers, reading stories, and gently rocking babies to sleep.
It turns out, we were very lucky that our kids did well. When it comes to meeting the national standards for home care environments, Oregon received just 48 out of 140 points.
How are these scores determined? The NACCRRA used 15 different criteria. It looked at the qualifications of the staff, including an educational background in child development. It reviewed the level of staff training on safety measures ranging from CPR to fire safety to containing the spread of infectious diseases. It considered how well the center communicated with parents about their child’s safety and over-all level of development. It also looked at whether inspections and complaints about a center were made available to all parents.
Why did Oregon do so badly? Well, for starters, Oregon doesn’t even require any regulation until adult/child ratio reaches 1:4. Then, it’s entirely hit or miss. Oregon actually did fairly well when it came to our general standards – we do have fairly high expectations of our child care providers. We expect them, among other things, to have background checks, an appropriate education and commit to on-going training in their field.
Where Oregon really fails is oversight, in the state’s monitoring of child care environments to ensure that indeed, these standards are being met. In this area, we rank 49th, just one notch above Idaho.
Today, more than half of all children under five are being cared for outside of the home for at least part of their day. During those hours, they should be getting a great start on their education, they should be safe, healthy and clean, and they should be enjoying their first, joyful friendships. This isn’t about whether day care is a good idea or not – for many families, having two working parents is simply the only economic choice. For these families, and their children, can we do better?
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Feb 9, '08
The next time we congratulate ourselves for being a progressive state, let's remember this. Anyone who works in the field of human services in Oregon knows just how backward Oregon really is, how unprotected children are, how many basic human needs go neglected.
12:14 p.m.
Feb 9, '08
A number of years ago The Oregonian had a reporter who's "beat" was childcare and there were lots of stories about the sad state of Oregon's child care system - problems at facilities and lack of effective enforcement of standards. Sadly, The Oregonian put the reporter on another beat and the status of child care in Oregon gets ignored, except for the occassional drug-related bust with a child care facility or most horrific abuse case. The Child Care Division is a part of the Employment Department and lacks the public scrutiny and public support to turn those numbers around. My bet is that few legislators in the substantive committees that have jurisdiction over child care can even name the head of the division.
1:33 p.m.
Feb 9, '08
Why do you think that is? Honestly. Oregon is progressive in alot of things (although not all, I know)and I truly believe very capable of living up to what folks here feel it can be. I moved here in 97 and have always heard about this concern for children in Oregon, as in other places. What keeps Oregon from being at the forefront of caring for and nurturing the next generation? We obviously care about the future or we wouldn't spend so much time working to preserve our environment and future liveability. Why does that forward thinking and caring not carry over to the people who will actually be living in that future?
These are just outloud thoughts. I'd like know what other folks think.
Feb 9, '08
Could this have anything to do with the fact that kids and many of their parents don't vote?
3:15 p.m.
Feb 9, '08
Yea, this is a big reason why I stopped working outside the home and concentrated solely on web design and maintenance. We had Abby in child care for a little while in 2004, and I wasn't happy with it. I don't think I could ever put my child back into day care again.
Feb 9, '08
"Why do you think that is? Honestly. What keeps Oregon from being at the forefront of caring for and nurturing the next generation? We obviously care about the future or we wouldn't spend so much time working to preserve our environment and future liveability. Why does that forward thinking and caring not carry over to the people who will actually be living in that future?"
It's about money and it's about power. A case in point.. the legislature is meeting. First order of business, adjust the budget with declining revenues expectation. At the top of cuts.. anticipated hiring of more child welfare workers. Abused and neglected children don't vote and don't fund political campaigns, and don't have lobbyists. .. Again.. lots of handwringing about the state of resources for the mentally ill (I worked for 30 years in the community mental health system.) and the dilapidated state hospital. Well it's been on the skids since the 1970s while more and more have been put out of institutions. Now our jails are the primary care facility for the mentally ill. Has this changed in the past 30 years..? no.. more and more cuts and neglect of the mentally ill. Why... the mentally ill don't vote, they don't fund campaigns, and they have no lobbyists. The environment, lots of window dressing but that's an issue that the affluent care about. However, the Willamette River is still a cesspool.
The reason.. Frankly we're all a bunch of hypocrites. We claim to care about children, we claim to care about the disabled, including the mentally ill. But we don't care one whit. We care about money and about power. I emphasize WE.. all of us..
8:55 p.m.
Feb 9, '08
Thank you Bill R for the fine constructive suggestions on how we resolve this problem. Perhaps Bill R will spearhead a grassroots program to raise this issue with the Leg and get them to increase funding and oversite for child protection relating to childcare facilities. My daughter is grown now but she did attend YMCA summer and after school care as a youth. My wife and I tried to keep an open dialog with the staff and caretakers, and never hesitated to voice our concern over the occasional minor problem. Many parents seemed oblivious, many made us feel like we were not paying enough attention. A tough business I think.
Feb 10, '08
"Perhaps Bill R will spearhead a grassroots program to raise this issue with the Leg and get them to increase funding and oversite for child protection relating to childcare facilities."
Ignoring your sarcasm, the question asked was not specifically about child care facilities but our self-satisfied perception that we are a "progressive" state. I tried to address that question in the larger way in which it was asked. We don't care because of our commonly held perception that we are NOT intricately connected to one another in local, state, national, and world community.
We are a culture consumed in a mythology that ignores interdependence, ignores community. We are among the lowest rated of first world countries in infant morality, access to health care, percentage of children in poverty, public services to the disabled, homelessness and so on. There's a reason for that, and we need to address that reason on a cultural societal level. Probably the best thing I can do for the needs of children or disabled, or the poor, in Oregon or elsewhere is help Barack Obama get elected. He does understand the problem, and he calls it "the empathy deficit." At least someone like him can begin to focus the national conversation away from the politics of resentment and fear of one another to that common human life that we share on this planet. We need to begin to name and live our unity as a national people. It may be idealism but it's also realism, that we are all interconnected, and we are all affected by what happens to any member of the local, national, or international community.
It is my hope that in the failures and breakdowns of the politics of "Me" we can begin to reshape the national soul into a politics of "We." Until Oregonians and Americans can make that shift and find the common ground, then we are doomed to fight each other in a zero sum game and to languish into a devolution and degradation of those infrastructures that make human life and community possible. That is true whether we are discussing child care, hunger, health care, environmental health, and the economic well-being of the American family.
9:30 a.m.
Feb 10, '08
Bill R.-I just really don't think that could have been put any better. Thank you.
Feb 10, '08
We are a culture consumed in a mythology...
Make that "mythologies" and a culture consumed in being consumers instead of citizens.
10:20 a.m.
Feb 10, '08
When I joined BlueOregon as a contributor it was this exact type of conversation that I was hoping to be a part of..and yes, Bill R., Obama has renewed my hope that some conditions in this country, conditions that are crying out for solutions, might actually change under his leadership.
Feb 10, '08
Krisin: "When I joined BlueOregon as a contributor it was this exact type of conversation that I was hoping to be a part of.."
It's the conversation we need to have. I would like to add that as, a dimension of changing the orientation of our politics to a "citizen culture" at the local level, I have a great faith in the power of private non-profits forming partnerships with government and the private sector. I worked for 20 years in a very creative and dynamic private non-profit agency. We succeeded in putting together some incredible programs and services across a broad range of services from preventive to chronic and acute clients. Our funding sources were private foundations, business, and government. And the fact we were not a part of government meant we had great flexibility in the way we operated while yet serving the public sector. Private non-profits are able develop strong advocacy in communities and a base of support. They can appeal to both conservative and progressive folks alike. I can see in an Obama presidency with his background in community organizing the potential for some big initiatives in this direction.
Feb 10, '08
Private non-profits can (and do) make some great strides in building community resources and raising quality of life, but the criticisms in the NACCRRA report weren't based on the actual quality of care being offered to Oregon children; rather, they were focused on the regulatory oversight applied to insure that state-imposed quality standards were being met.
Rating states according to level of oversight in their childcare is like rating companies by the number of pages in their employee manual. There are plenty of areas where we could do better in helping Oregon kids get ahead, but I don't know that this should be the highest priority. I can say with certainty that private not-for-profit agencies can't offer much help when it comes to regulatory issues, unless you think it's a good idea to outsource compliance checking to employees of non-governmental businesses, profit-seeking or not.
Feb 11, '08
"There are plenty of areas where we could do better in helping Oregon kids get ahead, but I don't know that this should be the highest priority. I can say with certainty that private not-for-profit agencies can't offer much help when it comes to regulatory issues, unless you think it's a good idea to outsource compliance checking to employees of non-governmental businesses, profit-seeking or not."
I was addressing the potential of non-profits, not to the question of regulation of care for kids but to the larger question of building human service infrastructure, educating the public and building networks of support for human service infrastructure and resources. But it has a bearing in the sense that it's about changing the point of view that the political culture has about interdependency and human needs. We don't adequately fund public services, especially those for human needs, whether they be governmental and regulatory, or whether they be provided by private non-profit. It's the culture of "me" vs. "we" again, or citizen vs. consumer culture as another stated. For myself the primary need is not regulation, although that is genuine, it is resources, and community support and advocacy.
12:19 a.m.
Feb 12, '08