Giving Back

[yodaone]

What types of things does your daycare do to give back to your community?

[permanentvacation]

I have provided child care for a very low rate and a couple of times for completely free to single parents who truly couldn't afford daycare, but were making too much money to be able to get vouchers. In order not to be used, taken advantage of, or make the parents not take financial responsibility of their child, I always put a time limit on how long I will watch their child for a low rate or for free, but it helps them get started in the right direction.

I don't quite think this answer is exactly what you were looking for, but by doing that, I helped members of the community be able to obtain safe childcare that provided their children with healthy meals and snacks and a good preschool education so their mothers could go to work.

[Unregistered]

We do an annual service project usually donating food and toys to a local food shelf or donating books to an organization that reads to children at pediatricians offices and gives the books to the children.
We have had some special years when we knew a family in need due to parents death, divorce, or homelessness, and donated holiday gifts and meals or household goods, whatever was needed.

[kidsandchicks]

What a good question! As an in home daycare with a mixed age group, I don't often come across a lot of service projects that I feel we could participate in. I have filled shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child with the kids and the older ones seem to understand what we're doing. A few years ago I organized a group project to 'adopt' kids at childrens home (think orphanage) for Christmas and all of my daycare families participated.

I look forward to reading other's answers.

[Blackcat31]

During the holidays, we give back instead of getting.

We choose a charity and collect donations.

We've collected for the veterans, elderly, homeless, food bank, fire department, animal shelter, etc etc.

We take a photo of the collected items with the kids and submit it to the local newspaper.

It meets our community involvement requirement.

[Josiegirl]

During the holidays, we give back instead of getting.

We choose a charity and collect donations.

We've collected for the veterans, elderly, homeless, food bank, fire department, animal shelter, etc etc.

We take a photo of the collected items with the kids and submit it to the local newspaper.

It meets our community involvement requirement.

I like that idea. How do you go about picking where your donations will go? Do you contact them to see what they need and get a list? Do you inform all the dcfs and just hope they'll contribute or do you and the dcks do it all yourselves? In other words, the cost falls on you?

[Lianne]

I foster cats and kittens for the SPCA and the kids help feed them and play with them which acclimates the cat to children and makes them more appealing to potential families

Starting at the beginning of December the kids bring in any change they find as well as any pet food, toys or supplies. During the week before Christmas I take the kids to the local dollar store and pet store to purchase pet related things. We then take all the donations to the SPCA

In February, the SPCA has a (nation-wide, I think) fundraiser called cupcake day. The kids take orders of cupcakes from their family and friends then the kids and I bake and decorate then deliver the cupcakes. We donate the money raised to the SPCA

Every summer we hold a lemonade stand and all the proceeds go to the SPCA

[Blackcat31]

I like that idea. How do you go about picking where your donations will go? Do you contact them to see what they need and get a list? Do you inform all the dcfs and just hope they'll contribute or do you and the dcks do it all yourselves? In other words, the cost falls on you?

We just pick whatever charity we want... I guess.

Most of the time we start talking about giving thanks and appreciate around Thanksgiving so we end up choosing a charity based on whatever or where ever the discussion takes us.

Yes, I will contact whatever organization and ask them what items they are in need of. For example this last holiday season we collected items for the food bank....now normally I think that would mean food...right? Nope, they said they were the most in need of personal items...toothpaste, shampoo, soap etc. Good to know...

I send a letter to the parents letting the know that our focus for the holidays is giving not getting and that their participation is not required but appreciated. I include a list of what items we are collecting.

Almost every single one of my families will participate. Most go above and beyond.

I have not had a year yet where there was not an abundance of items donated.

My personal favorite is the year we decided to donate to the fire dept. We collected carbon monoxide detectors since smoke detectors are required by law for landlords but carbon monoxide detectors are often over looked and we had a few tragic stories happen that year so it just seemed like the right thing at that time.

We ended up collecting almost 2 dozen detectors and gave them to the fire dept. The fire dept gave them to families in need.

It's never a cost to me as we only donate what we collect.

One year we did an entire holiday meal for a needy family. Each DCK was assigned a food item to bring in (1 box of stuffing or 1 can of cranberry sauce etc) and $1. I had 15 families so with the $15 we bought a turkey. Add all the items together and we had a complete holiday meal for a family of 4-6. We donated the box to the food bank. They determined which family needed it most. The DCK's made a card to include with it as well.

[laundrymom]

We donate money to the teams our kids and friends kids play on.
Band, karate, little league. Etc.