The Butte College Child Development Center (CDC) strives to provide high-quality child care that is respectful of and responsive to children by developing a partnership with the parents and families. To provide high-quality lab instruction to incoming students who are learning to work in the Child Development Center. Our goals are to promote optimal growth for their child, while supporting student learning spanning a variety of disciplines.
The CDC serves nearly 250 college students per semester. These services range from offering laboratory opportunities to providing child care to students from all disciplines. The CDC serves as a lab for the following programs: Child Development/Family Relations (CDF), Nursing, EMT-Paramedics, Foods and Nutrition, Communication Studies, and Education. The CDC is conveniently located on the main campus. Last year nearly one hundred families were served. These were made up of college students, faculty, staff and the greater community. Our funding sources come primarily from the District and from parent tuition. The CDC has four classrooms serving infants, toddlers, and preschoolers. Breakfast and afternoon snack are offered to all children in our program. The CDC is reimbursed for meals through the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP). In fall of 2015 we received child care vouchers for Student Equity students giving them free childcare as well as giving our center three student interns who help support the center in a variety of ways. The Strategic Plan directs us to focus on and increase student success. The CDC serves a population not mentioned in the strategic plan, parents. More than 90% of the children served by the CDC are children of Butte College students. Many of our students have young children and need reliable child care in order to continue their education. The CDC is committed to the success of these students and provides high-quality child care on-campus, thus alleviating the student’s anxiety over transportation and care needs of their young children. The CDC fulfills an essential need for these students and, therefore, is a vital link to their success. In addition to providing high quality and reliable child care, the CDC is continually looking at ways to help students. We were approved for student equity funding to support our student parents on the dashboard. We also secured funding from the California Department of Education to help secure slots for preschool aged children. This CSPP program on site provides free to low cost child care for parents who qualify. In the past few years, the CDC in collaboration with the Child Development and Family Relations (CDF) instructors have been working on the Curriculum Alignment Program (CAP) and a Transfer Degree to develop foundational core courses that can be easily transferable between community colleges and the California State University system. The CDC is moving forward to provide students with the best experience possible within these core classes that utilize the CDC lab. This effort has primarily focused on a number of time students are in the lab as determined by each lab related course. The result is a less flexible yet highly efficient schedule with concentrated groups of students moving through the lab within a 13-week window. Recently the infant classroom began to take in children less than 12 months old and is maintaining a 1 to 4 teacher ratio. This change has allowed for college students to return to school even sooner by creating a safe environment for their baby while they are in class. In addition, this change has also allowed our lab students to observe children as young as 6 weeks old through 5 years old. As we look to the future, it is important that the CDC continues to fulfill its mission as well as develop new plans. By increasing quality, early care and education the CDC is aligned with a campus strategic initiative, enhancing and innovative, flexible, responsive and accountable culture, as well as increasing the availability of critical services. The community’s need for high quality early care and education is recognized and plans are being developed to better meet these needs.
The CDC received funding to remove the old playground structure and purchase a more safe and age appropriate playground structure for our toddler yard.
This funding allowed us to have an age appropriate playground structure and removed a safety harzard from our last Keenen playground safety inspection.
The Child Development Center has two main goals:
• To provide high-quality child care to student parents on campus.
• To serve as an evidenced based high-quality learning environment for Child Development/Early Childhood Education lab students. The Child Development Centers collaborates with CDF Instructional faculty to modeling and demonstrating the following course objectives:
a. Integrate understandings of children’s needs and development in order to develop and maintain healthy, safe, respectful, supportive, and challenging learning environments.
b. Evaluate the effectiveness of early childhood curriculum, classroom environments, teaching strategies and how teachers involve families in their children’s development and learning to improve teaching practices for all children.
c. Design, implement and evaluate curriculum activities that are based on observation, documentation, and assessment of young children.
d. Apply a variety of effective approaches, strategies and techniques supporting positive relationships with children and adults.
e. Critically assess ones’ own teaching experiences to guide and inform practice.
f. Demonstrate the interpersonal skills necessary to successfully participate in an early care and educations setting.
g. Evaluate and utilize a recordkeeping system to document and track children’s progress.
h. Use and articulate current research and understanding development and learning theories to select effective learning materials and experiences for young children.
i. Demonstrate professional behavior and preparing the students for entering the workforce and guiding them through the process
The CDC helps support the college to meet its student achievement standards by providing much-needed childcare for student parents attending Butte College. This allows our students to focus on attaining degrees and certificates. The CDC also supports lab classes that are required for transfer degrees to a CSU for all child development centers. We allow student parents enrolled in our program the flexibility to continue their education while we care for their child. Parents receiving the student equity childcare stipends receive additional study time they need in order to complete their course units. The CDC serves nursing students, the police academy, and various other career and tech programs as well as early childhood professionals.
The Child Development Center serves as a career training ground for students who are attending courses in Child Development/Early Childhood Education. The center serves as a lab facility that is required for course completion to transfer or graduate in this field.
The additional way the Child Development Center serves students on campus toward their path of success is by providing child care for their children. With their children on campus, they are free to enroll in courses that will help them attain their degree, certificate, or transfer. Many of our student parents are on the career and tech track. Our services provide student parents to work on retention and access. The Child Development Center also receives funds from student equity allowing student parents that are disproportionally impacted such as veterans and foster youth. As part of the requirements, we collect data on these parents and they are reported to have significant access to enrolling full-time on campus.
The CDC unit plan is our Administrative Program Review.
The Child Development Center has two main goals:
• To provide high-quality child care to student parents on campus.
• To serve as an evidenced based high-quality learning environment for Child Development/Early Childhood Education lab students. The Child Development Centers collaborates with CDF Instructional faculty to modeling and demonstrating the following course objectives:
a. Integrate understandings of children’s needs and development in order to develop and maintain healthy, safe, respectful, supportive, and challenging learning environments.
b. Evaluate the effectiveness of early childhood curriculum, classroom environments, teaching strategies and how teachers involve families in their children’s development and learning to improve teaching practices for all children.
c. Design, implement and evaluate curriculum activities that are based on observation, documentation, and assessment of young children.
d. Apply a variety of effective approaches, strategies and techniques supporting positive relationships with children and adults.
e. Critically assess ones’ own teaching experiences to guide and inform practice.
f. Demonstrate the interpersonal skills necessary to successfully participate in an early care and educations setting.
g. Evaluate and utilize a recordkeeping system to document and track children’s progress.
h. Use and articulate current research and understanding development and learning theories to select effective learning materials and experiences for young children.
i. Demonstrate professional behavior and preparing the students for entering the workforce and guiding them through the process.
Strategy 1 - Renovating and Infrastructure- New Equipment
The Child Development center is in need of infrastucture repairs/equipment replacement in the following ways:
The CDC requires equipment and materials for the health and safety of children and students.
Strategy 2 - Staffing
The CDC requires:
Currently, we have two classrooms with only one Children Program Specialist. For safety reasons, there should be two qualified staff in each classroom. We secured classroom support with our CSSP grant on the preschool side but this still leaves us with one infant/ toddler teacher alone. It is challenging to supervise the children and support the college lab students at the same time. Ideally, each classroom should have an opening shift and a closing shift. We made adjustments and made sure our toddler room has two Children Program Specialists but that leaves only one in the infant room. Our infant room has a huge wait list and we can only accommodate four at this time.
With an increase of staffing at the CDC, the CDC could enroll even more children for lab students to observe. In previous semesters lab, students were choosing to go to other centers off-site because the CDC had too few children to observe or work with. Our goal is to provide more high-quality care to student parents on campus as well as Butte staff. There is a particularly high need in our area for infant and toddler care in our area and there is a significant wait list. The CDC can not keep up with the high demand. With adding one Children Program specialist in the toddler room could increase tuition up to $10,000 a month. Budgetary needs aside hiring one more teacher for the infant toddler side would get us closer to NAEYC accreditation high-quality ratios.
Returning the Master Teacher's assistants is of high need. We have secured funding for two preschool assistants through our CSPP (California State Preschool) grant. These positions are necessary to give the quality care to the children at the center. These positions cover breaks, lunches, and off the floor time for reviewing lab students. We currently do not have staff coverage for the infant and toddler teachers breaks. Often times the center uses subs or the director steps on. It is not in the best interest of the program safety or quality to have the director in a classroom. The high demand for paperwork for the CACFP program and CSPP is difficult to complete when the director is covering ratios. We are mandated to maintain ratios by our Community Care Licensing regulation. We also need support doing dishes and preparing meals.
We currently do not have funding for Internships at the CDC. Working in the CDC is usually the first step on the student’s career pathway often offering them their first real world experience. These internships have continually proven to lead to competitive jobs in the field of Early Childhood Education both within the surrounding communities and beyond.
The CDC requires a larger Substitute budget due to the high need for support at the center. If a Children's Program Specialist is gone someone has to teach their class. Maternity leave, disability, and regular sick days put significantly higher usage of subs.
Strategy 3 - Instructional Materials for Lab
The CDC serves a large number of students on a daily basis. They come into our classrooms looking for models of the highest quality teaching examples. Our environment needs to be updated dramatically. The field of Child Development, much like Psychology and Medicine, is a field that sees constant change; and yet the CDC has remained exactly the same over the past few decades. Due to budget restrictions, the CDC has not been able to purchase much needed instructional materials for the classroom. Every semester the CDC completes an Environmental Rating Scale and every semester the results come back the same. The CDC does not have the items in the classroom required of them to be a high-quality learning environment. In order to model what a proper learning center looks like, we need to purchase many items. Most of the toys in the classrooms are used items that the Master teachers have brought in. Many items in a learning center are only good for a few years and need to be replaced such as puzzles, books, easels, and dolls. The CDC desperately needs these things in order to serve the children and lab students.
The CDC needs to enhance its instructional materials to model appropriate learning environment. Most of the toys have to be repurchased due to health and safety concerns. Toys are worn, have sharper edges, and need to be updated. As the field changes so do the quality and safety standards. Outside playground structure in toddler needs to be replaced due to recommendations of our playground safety inspection.
In order for the CDC to provide high-quality safe services we need:
Strategy 4 - Promotional Materials
The CDC is at a time of growth and development. Bringing back our infant component has brought back the interest of employees and student parents. We did receive a CSPP grant and will need money to promote the center in the surrounding communities. Flyers, brochures, and other promotional materials will help us to advertise our growing center. Along with these promotional items, the website needs to be redone and updated with current and relevant information
The center is at the very back of the campus. In order to get more information about our program the CDC needs to advertise. The CDC will need promotional materials in the form of:
Strategy 5 - Budget Augmentation- Tuition shortfall
The CDC tuition pays for supplies for the center as well as the salary for the secretary and the director position. Last year we did not use this augmentation. Lack of staff means fewer children in the center for tuition accounts. At this time we are seeing a rapid increase in enrollment but can not keep up with student parent demand. We secured a California state preschool grant and the enrollment needs to grow. Taking on this contract caused a huge increase in tuition. The more children we have the more center needs in supplies like food and gloves. The Centers budget is no longer functional for the budgetary needs of the program. In the event we are not awarded additional staff to increase our capacity we will need to enroll fewer children which again will leave us in a deficit. This augmentation will keep the facilities running while we work on bringing in more staff and gain more enrollment.
Having the budget augmentation will allow the CDC to keep operating regardless of the amount of tuition it brings in. This sustains the quality care and lab classroom. The more staff the center has bigger the capacity for enrollment. The larger the enrollment the more students and children we can serve.
Strategy 6 - NAEYC Accredidation
The CDC wishes to pursue Accreditation through a nationally recognized agency such as the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC). The areas for self-study and improvement would include: Please keep in mind that our infant toddler side does not have the staffing ratio to move forward on this strategy at the time but this is something we aspire to do.
· Leadership and management
· Teacher qualifications
· Professional Growth and Development
· Group sizes and ratios
· Relationships
· Families and community relationships
· Assessment of children's progress
· Assessment tools
· Health and safety
· Physical environment
· Curriculum
In a highly competitive market and an ever improving field, national accreditation would help the CDC to continue to be a leader in the community and within the field of Early Childhood Education. This would help the CDC in the following ways:
None at this time.
The CDC is presently being funded beyond the Child Development Program by the following:
CSPP (California State Preschool Grant $50,000.00
CACFP (Food Program) $ 3,000.
Parent Tuition/Registration $140,000.00
Student Equitiy Scholarships for student parents $46,000.00
The preschool side received $23,000 in start-up funding to get much needed supplies to increase quality on the preschool side.
Perkins provided the center with $7000 for quality lab equipment for the infant/toddler side for the 15/16 year. This helped us to meet higher scores on the ITERS.
| Original Priority | Program, Unit, Area | Resource Type | Account Number | Object Code | One Time Augment | Ongoing Augment |
| Description | Supporting Rationale | Potential Alternative Funding Sources | Prioritization Criteria | |||
| 1 | Art/Fam (CDC) | Personnel | 11-000-520-1-30500 | $120,000.00 | $120,000.00 | |
| Support for Child care services | The CDC requires: * One additional Children's Program Specialist *Two Master Teacher Assistants *Internships *A substantial substitute budget Currently, we have one classroom where there is only one Children’s Program Specialist. It is not best health and safety practices for this to occur. The Children's Program Specialist also provides instructional assistant duties for Child Development faculty. If there is only one staff member in a classroom this makes it difficult to instruct the lab students. The CDC requires for there to be two paid staff in all four classrooms to open and close the center daily. Currently, we are using substitutes and the director to cover the staffing gaps. The director must be available for health and safety issues that can occur. |
|
|
|||
| 2 | Art/Fam (CDC) | Equipment | $60,000.00 | $0.00 | ||
| Renovating and Infrastructure- New Equipment | Eliminating the health and safety issues in the kitchen and resurfacing playards. |
|
|
|||
| 3 | Art/Fam (CDC) | Operating Expenses | $7,000.00 | $0.00 | ||
| Promotional Materials | The CDC is at a time of growth and development. Bringing back our infant component has brought back the interest of student parents. We secured a california state preschool grant offers free to low cost care to our preschoolers who qualify. That being said we will need money to promote the center in the surrounding communities. Flyers, brochures, and other promotional materials will help us to advertise our growing center. Along with these promotional items the website needs to be redone and updated with current and relevant information. |
|
|
|||
| 4 | Arts/Fam (CDC) | Equipment | $3,000.00 | $1,000.00 | ||
| Instructional Materials for lab | The CDC needs to enhance its instructional materials to model appropriate learning environment. As the career changes so do the material and safety standards. In order to provide high quality and safe services the center must have: dolls math manipulatives books fine motor manipulatives science materials multicultural materials new materials for outside infant climbing structure puzzles |
|
|
|||
| 5 | Art/Fam (CDC) | Operating Expenses | $60,000.00 | $0.00 | ||
| Budget Augmentation-tuition shortfall | The CDC tuition pays for supplies for the center as well as the salary for the secretary and the director position. Last year we did not use this augmentation. Lack of staff means fewer children in the center for tuition accounts. At this time, we are seeing a rapid increase in enrollment but cannot keep up with student parent demand. We secured a California state preschool grant and the enrollment needs to grow. Taking on this contract caused a huge increase in tuition. The more children we have the more center needs in supplies like food and gloves. The Centers budget is no longer functional for the budgetary needs of the program. In the event we are not awarded additional staff to increase our capacity we will need to enroll fewer children which again will leave us in a deficit. This augmentation will keep the facilities running while we work on bringing in more staff and gain more enrollment. |
|
|
|||