Early Childhood Professional Development Day
Monday, July 26, 2010
It was nice to meet some new providers on Saturday at the Early Childhood Professional Development Day held at Butler CC campus. I was thrilled with the opportunity to take free classes and to get paid $100. The classes I attended were KDHE & SRS, Pediatric First Aid, and CPR. I wanted to write briefly about each class I attended. I'd also enjoy any comments about any classes others went to.
KDHE & SRS
I understand the importance of providers accepting SRS families, but the SRS part of the class scared me away. I was not thrilled with the stories I heard or about the chances for fraud. However, the class did teach me a few things about SRS:
*New providers will be sent an approval notice within 10 days.
*Providers no longer receive the copy of the childcare plan because SRS wants parents to take responsibility.
*SRS does not mediate in payment issues; they expect providers to treat them just as they would with a private pay family.
*SRS does not want providers to use a substitute unless in an extreme emergency.
*Providers need to keep records for SRS children for 3 years.
The KDHE part of the meeting was informative. I just wish we'd had more time with Kristi to find out more or ask more questions. Some highlights include:
*Lexie's Law should bring about more consistent trainings for providers as funded by the higher costs for renewals.
*If Registered to Licensed providers do have citations for noncompliance, these providers will have 5 days to come up with a plan.
*If a provider disagrees with a citation, she can complete a written statement for an Administrative review. If the finding turns out to be invalid, it will be taken off the provider's record. If it is valid, KDHE will explain how to fix the citation.
*KDHE has to take every complaint even if it is not a substantiated one.
*Providers will have 60 days to complete their 15 initial training hours. If she cannot get this, KDHE will give out up to 2 more temporary permits and up to 180 days.
*The local health departments will call to set up initial inspections of Registered to Licensed providers.
*If you send in a late renewal, the fee doubles to $170. Renewals more than 30 days late result in the daycare considered to be without a license. The provider would then need to start over.
*The open records part of Lexie's Law goes into effect May 2011. As I've written before, they are still working on how and what with this system. It likely will include the daycare name and address.
*Kristi Lawent can b reached at 785-296-1275.
Pediatric First Aid
We watched a video that we mostly laughed at. The best part of this class was practicing with an Epi pen.
CPR
This was the best CPR class that I've ever taken. The instructor was humorous. I loved how interactive the class was. Instead of read a book, watch a video, practice like the Red Cross classes I've taken, this class allowed us to interact with each other, one of the instructor's helpers, and the dummies. I learned more in this time than I've learned previously. If you took the class, you will know what I'm writing next!
Stayin' alive.
Ah, ha, ha, ha,
Stayin' alive.
Posts
"Lexie's Law should bring about more consistent trainings for providers as funded by the higher costs for renewals."
While Lexie's Law will bring about consistent training requirements for all providers, education is ABSOLUTELY NOT funded by the higher costs for renewals. Under HB2356 our renewal fees will now be placed in a special fund (vs. the State General Fund) and used SOLELY for subsidizing the cost of inspections of day cares.
Open Records - KDHE was told by the Senate NOT to use providers personal information such as addresses and phones for the safety of the children and the provider, before they passed Lexie's Law.
Think of how dangerous this would be? Where any stranger could find out where a woman lives and that she is home alone with small children during the day!