Daycare Hunting, Part 1

We're thinking about giving Iain a few days a week of daycare, starting in the fall. He'll be 18 months old in October, and his interest in Callie suggests that he might enjoy playing with other kids. Plus, daycare would provide some enrichment activities we do not. Like singing. I don't sing. Ever.

So we've begun the hunt for a daycare that might suit us. It's not easy, for lots of reasons.

For one thing, there's no single source to tell me all my options. So it took a significant amount of Googling, asking around, and generally surfing the web to find a set of potential venues, and even then I found that some questions went unanswered. Is there a Unitarian daycare here? I don't think so, but the huge, thriving UU church suggests there might be. No indication of it on their website, though...

Anyway.

Yesterday I visited Option #1. Option #1 was not a success. Here's what I did not like:

• 1. When I asked about staff turnover, the teacher smirked and said, "You'll want to ask [the Director] about that." Oh.

• 2. This daycare represented a particular philosophy. Yet none of the teachers, staff, or administration actually held those beliefs, nor did they understand the most basic tenets of the system. The result was some pretty comical confusion about things like lunch.

• 3. While the Director told me that I should get on the waiting list because they often have spots due to people on the list being unavailable in fall (this daycare is on a school-year model so you start in fall), the Assistant Director said, "Oh, no. We're full and there are 60 people on the list so you won't get in. And if you did, you'd have to pay from August until he's 18 months, but he couldn't come till then." Oh.

• 4. Probably due to the 60-family waiting list, no one really cared that I came to visit and no one really had any interest in talking to me. They weren't rude, but they weren't exactly excited.

• 5. Last, but certainly not least, there was a little confusion about history/culture/reality. I was attracted to this daycare because it touts its diversity. Ok, so I asked "In the current kids, do you have national and religious diversity?" "Oh yes," said the teacher. "Do you have kids who are from faith traditions other than Jewish and Christian?" "Yes," she said, "We have Catholic kids!" Uh....

This was my first such visit, and I anticipate that some of these things will look different after I've checked out other options. But still. I left our names on the list, but I'm not what you'd call thrilled. Of course, since Iain won't get in, I doubt it will matter.

Any advice from those of you who have experience would be most welcome.