360degree Interviews?

[happyday]

Hi all,

I am a Newbie, beginning my research for a home based day care. I am 5 months pregnant, and my husband and I are looking into the option for my next career.

Question: have any of the providers done 360 interviews? Meaning, the dcp interviews at your home, and you interview at their home.

I am thinking about this b/c you can tell a lot about parents/children by their home life. People can appear to have their lives in order, but upon seeing their homes, and how their children act at home, you may be able to discover issues/problems that may not have surfaced until later.

We will have a limited number of spaces for dck, and I want to make sure each parent/child will be a good fit for us. I am sure some parents will balk at this but I will cross that bridge when I come to it.

TIA

[DinTx]

If you have time, sounds like a great idea.
Short of that, what most providers I know do, is to give a 3 week trial period in which the contract can be voided if it's not a good fit for either party.

Going into their home may not give you a clear picture of how the kids will behave in your care. Kids behavior can vary, and can often be worse when in parents care.
Good luck to you!!

[DCMom]

Interesting idea. My daughters Kindy teacher did come to our home for a 30 minute visit before the year started; it's a new thing in our school district. I thought it was kind of cool. But I can see where some people would be uncomfortable with it.

[NEDaycare]

Excellent Idea!

I never thought about doing that, but it is an excellent idea! I know it would have saved me a whole lot of turn over had I done that from the beginning. If they have nothing to hide, then they wont mind. This town is a huge drug and crime town, with 49.3% of the people in the town on public assistance, which absolutely does not mean anything in and of itself (I know people hit rough spots, and there are a lot of non-lifers that are on public assistance working hard to be independent, and my hat is off to them), but when some of them apply for State assistance, the vast majority of the families I've accepted have not even finished their required job search and resume classes, which are only two weeks long, or they've reverted back to drugs or violated probation and then did not show up to daycare with no call because they'd already used their "one call" from jail. So, I know I've had a few slip under the radar that would not have if I'd done the 360 interview. After all, you are allowing them into your home and your life, and will be on a daily basis, so why would they not allow you to visit them one time?

[Unregistered]

I have a two week trial period, so if I find we are not a good fit, we can call it quits. I think it would take up way too much time , to then interview them in their homes. I don't think it matters how clean their houses are, or really how their kids behave. In reality , the children will most likely behave differently for the provider then they do their parents. This is not always true, but I find that often my daycare children are very wellbehaved for me, but when the parents come to pick up they turn into different children,and I am left thinking "Wow, they would never do that in my care!".

The bottom line is you really dont know how well it will work out until you give it a go.
Adn also , it may seem insensitive, but I would not want to waste that much of my personal time on the interview process, we are either a good fit and willing to try it out , or we are not. You never know how long a family will stay in your daycare, i would be annoyed spending that much time on an interview to have them leave after a few months. I think sometimes you need to get to knwo them along the way.