NEWS

Chat transcript: Day care investigation in Nashville

The Tennessean
A Tennessean investigation reveals a disconnect between the perceived quality of care at child care centers and what state inspectors actually found.

Readers engaged with the editor and reporters of The Tennessean report on day care violations from our Sunday edition in a live chat Monday.

Researching your day care: a how-to guide

Nashville day cares earn top marks despite safety violations

11:12

Comment from LH

Is there a reason you focused on Never Grow Up in this story? I would think there's several other day cares you could have investigated. Personally, our family has had wonderful experiences with The Academy.

11:12

Jessica Bliss: We examined the records for more than three dozen facilities in Davidson and Williamson counties that had civil violations or had been put on probation from 2011 to 2014. We called for comment from one of those day care facilities, we were directed to Never Grow Up. As we further researched that company, we discovered it had violations in multiple states, and began to examine why DHS would allow a company with such a track record out of state to open here in Tennessee.

11:14

Comment from Veronica

Was this day care company the biggest violator in TN or did you find more widespread violations?

11:14

Jessica Bliss: We can't speak to the whole state, but we looked deeply at Middle Tennessee records and this company owned 12 facilities here.

11:17

Anita Wadhwani: We did find violations at other child care centers in Middle Tennessee. More to come about those at Tennessean.com tomorrow.

11:17

Comment from Jennifer

1. I don't think this is breaking news. 2. This story was focused on a company that took care of my children from the time they were born and I NEVER had an issue. 3. In "reporting" about the DHS shortfalls you spoke poorly about a company that has done so much for their parents. You can attack DHS all you want but why go after this company? No I don't work for them, but we loved it there and if they had after school care for older children I would send mine there. No one is perfect and things will happen, we are all human, but I do know if anything has happened the step and measures that need to happen, happened. You owe this company an apology.

11:17

Jessica Bliss: As we noted in the story, violations don't happen every day. The majority of Nashville child care centers have never received a major penalty for rule violations — just 33 of 290 licensed centers operating in Davidson County between 2011 and 2014 were cited with violations that rose to the level of civil penalties.

We focused specifically on these child care centers, many of which still receive the highest star rating from DHS despite violations that call in to question the welfare of children.

11:19

Matthew Leonard: I would also highlight another part of the story: that the violations, for people looking at them, are more available online in Kentucky and Indiana than they are here in Tennessee.

11:19

Jessica Bliss: We have more in our investigation coming, and tomorrow we will look closely at other small facilities with major violations that are receiving state money for care. In total, we look at 19 agencies that got paid nearly $10 million over a four-year period despite findings of lax oversight that led to child injuries in some cases.

11:20

Comment from Veronica

Did you see a connection between violations and socioeconomic status of the area of the centers?

11:25

Matthew Leonard: Good question Veronica, we were looking to overlay income census on these reports, but they are still a relatively small sample from only 2 counties so it's hard to extrapolate. Also part of the story is that these agencies are subsidized to provide care to kids from low-income families. It would be interesting to see what the catchment areas for enrollments were.

11:29

Comment From JW

Because the state makes tracking the violation history so difficult, will you publish (or link to) all of the records that you were able to get?

11:29

Jessica Bliss: JW: There are hundreds of pages of documents. We have scanned and posted some of those related to our investigation, and we will continue more as they apply. In the meantime, parents can do their own research. Here's an idea of how to start.

11:29

Comment From Kara

How do we find out what was done after an incident was reported to DHS, and if the incident was a one-off, or a recurring incident?

11:30

Matthew Leonard: Hi Kara, take a look at the resource package in the link above.

11:31

Jessica Bliss: If you look at the violations reports published by DHS, it names the evaluator for each facility with a telephone number you can call for more information about a specific violation finding.

11:35

Comment From GoDawgs61

Hi! We recently moved to Middle TN and have chosen The Academy for child care based on such positive recommendations from friends, family and local publication reviews. My question is for the reporters. Do you have young children in child care? If so, who do you trust with your children while you are at work? We put a lot of time and effort when choosing a place and are shocked to read such negative things about The Academy.

11:35

Jessica Bliss: I have children in child care. I was personally surprised to find the three-star rating that I held in high regard when deciding on child care did not reflect health and safety violations of facilities.

"Compliance history” — an agency’s record of breaking the rules — is only one of the factors DHS considers. In fact, the system skews more heavily toward evaluating the qualifications of a center's staff and leadership than its day-to-day operations. It also relies heavily on prescheduled program observation for three to four hours by a DHS worker.

For child care centers, DHS calculates the overall star rating by averaging the score from seven categories: director qualifications, professional development, developmental learning, parent/family involvement, ratio and group size, staff compensation and program assessment.

A new star rating is assigned by DHS with each new licensing year. It considers compliance history only from the previous 12-month period. So a child care center that two years ago was cited for significant supervision, safety or transportation violations may in this year have a three-star rating. As a result, the star rating does not serve as the most comprehensive tool for parents interested in assessing an agency's violation history.

11:36

Jessica Bliss: Every parent’s assessment of a child care facility is going to be different based on the elements he or she values most — caregiver’s experience, educational curriculum, personal development, compassion of care, etc.

And many parents, including myself, hold word of mouth in high regard when making this decision.

11:37

Matthew Leonard: Here is the link to 16 pages of records from Sunday's story.

11:40

Anita Wadhwani: My children are older now, but like Jessica I looked at the star rating when making decisions about the best child care center for our family. We learned that researching child care center histories is not as simple as reviewing their star rating.

11:42

Comment From Greer

Did you investigate why the Academy at Harpeth Village only has two stars instead of three? Was there a particular violation tied to this? If so, which one?

11:42

Jessica Bliss: Greer: If you go to the DHS website and look up Harpeth Village, you can get a more detailed breakdown of how the facility ranked in each of the seven evaluation categories.

For child care centers, DHS calculates the overall star rating by averaging the score from seven categories: director qualifications, professional development, developmental learning, parent/family involvement, ratio and group size, staff compensation and program assessment.

It looks like the facility received 0 stars in the director qualifications assessment category and 1 star in ratio and group size.

Director qualifications: Looks at how much education and experience the director has. The director must plan the entire program and train caregivers.

Ratio and group size: Shows how many adults are supervising the children and how many children are grouped together. The state mandates maximum ratios for each age group, but some centers offer more caregivers and smaller groups for more personalized attention and supervision.

11:45

Comment From LH

If you're going to have the violations for one company on the front page, you need to list the violations of other companies as well. Also, did you look into how great Never Grow Up is? Visit one of their facilities — they're staffed with awesome people. Also, The Academy won Best of Parenting for its eighth straight year.

11:45

Anita Wadhwani: LH: The investigation is continuing. We will have more about other child care centers with violations tomorrow at www.tennessean.com. We also included extensive comments from Never Grow Up's owner and he acknowledged the violations at his facilities here and in other states.

11:48

Comment From Mabel

My kids go to an Academy and have had a good experience. But I was a little taken aback by the owner's quotes, especially the one comparing it to an airliner, and also the fact that he didn't have any child care experience prior to opening the centers. What was your impression of how he was taking the story? Clearly it's a serious issue you all were raising — did you get a sense that he was taking the story seriously? Also what are some reasons why it's so hard to get this day care violation information in TN? Shouldn't it be transparent and easy for the public to obtain?

11:50

Comment From Matt

I'm curious if during the interview process DHS acknowledged how difficult it can be for parents to gather all the information on child care centers in a timely and effective manner, and if they have plans to improve it/make more of it readily available online. If they did not, might I suggest that for one of The Tennessean's next focuses on the editorial pages as well.

11:50

Anita Wadhwani: Matt: When asked, DHS responded they are "always looking" for ways to improve the quality and safety of its licensed child care facilities.

11:51

Matthew Leonard: Would an integrated reporting system that combined safety, supervision, transport and HEALTH violations be useful to parents researching facilities for their children? This is what the articles are aiming to ask.

11:53

Comment From Kara

Also, why are there no ratings for Primrose Schools listed?

11:54

Matthew Leonard: Hi Kara:

To find the violations, go to Tennessee's Department of Human Services homepage, (www.tennessee.gov/humanservices), click on "Find Child Care" under the Families header. Then search by county.

You will see a Tennessee map and you can click on a specific county to pull up day cares by ZIP code. When you click on a particular ZIP code, a list of day care centers comes up, and on the far right is a column titled "Compliance History."

Click on the "Compliance History" link and you will see if it has had any violations dating back through July 2013.

If there is a violation, DHS lists the date it happened, the date it was corrected and a brief description. For example, one violation at La Petite Academy in Goodlettsville read, "Observation: On September 10, 2015 a four year old child was left in the early preschool classroom by himself unsupervised. 1240-04-03-.06 Supervision."

Supervision is the type of violation. The observation is a short synopsis of what the program evaluator saw and noted.

11:54

Anita Wadhwani: Mabel: In answer to your last two questions (Jessica will hop on shortly to answer your questions about the owner), other states routinely post their full inspection records online and have for some time. TN DHS began posting limited information in 2014, but does not make those full reports available online. The agency took 6 months to provide us records of 38 child care centers. So, yes, I do think these records should be transparent and easy for the public to obtain, but the reality in Tennessee is that they are not.

11:54

Comment From Jennifer

You might want to investigate Nashville "BEST IN PARENTING" and see how they got it so wrong awarding them Best of from 2008-2014. We the parents who send/sent our children there voted!

11:54

Comment From Jennifer

They went after them because they are a larger company, which creates a better story. I am sure there are TONS of smaller or home ran day cares with violations but writing that piece would not have gotten any traction.

11:55

Matthew Leonard: That piece is out tomorrow Jennifer.

11:57

Comment From Mabel

6 months?! Do these requests fall under open records or are they an exception?

11:57

Matthew Leonard: Yes they fall under open records.

11:58

Comment From Ron Hall

Thanks for doing this story!

11:58

Comment From Mabel

Isn't a 6-month response time a violation of open records?

11:58

Anita Wadhwani: Jennifer: We are aware of the Nashville Parent vote. We are also aware the Academy incentivizes parents to vote for them in "Best of Parenting" by offering them a chance for a free week of tuition if they do.

12:00

Anita Wadhwani: Mabel: The Tennessee Public Records Act sets a "reasonable" standard for providing records, but not a specific deadline. In our view, we believe these records should have been readily available to us, and to any parent.

12:01

Matthew Leonard: You can continue the conversation with our reporters, please check out our next report tomorrow, and we will be back here at 11 a.m. on Wednesday to answer additional questions during another live chat.

12:03

Comment From Kara

Hi Matthew, Yes I've visited that, and there is no rating information for Primrose. Do they not have to submit to compliance checks? Only Primrose schools in Hixson and East Brainerd have any ratings or compliance history information available.

12:04

Matthew Leonard: Kara — email Jessica or Anita and they can walk you through how to find that information.

12:04

Anita Wadhwani: Kara: There are 10 Primrose schools listed on the DHS website. If you would like to email Jessica or me, we can walk you through finding out the information for the centers you are interested in. awadhwani@tennessean.com or jbliss@tennessean.com

12:05

Comment From pse

What are the end goals of your article? How would you like to see the star rating system revised?

12:05

Jessica Bliss: PSE: Ideally, star ratings would take in to account a child care facility's violation history beyond just the past licensing year. Additionally, it would put more emphasis on health and safety, perhaps including local health department inspections.

12:07

Matthew Leonard: This concludes the chat for today. Thank you all for your interest and questions  we can talk again on Wednesday at the same time.