Academy at Cold Spring - opinions?

[Anonymous]

Does anyone have any experience with or know anything about the Academy at Cold Spring's infant and toddler rooms? Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!

[Anonymous]

I toured the school today because I am looking for care in the Bethesda area. I currently have my baby in Bright Horizons at USPTO in Alexandria but have been offered the opportunity to work at home full-time.

I was not impressed with what I saw at Academy.

The building is a modular unit so all the rooms are very small. The infant room has a door to the outside which was propped open because according to the infant teacher the room was too hot otherwise. During the tour, two of the older mobile babies escaped. The teacher did not notice. She went to show us the outside play area only to discover two children on the ramp from the door. There was a gate at the end of the ramp so the kids would not have gotten far but nevertheless, two children under 18 months were outside unsupervised without the teachers' knowledge. They could have been abducted, attacked by a dog etc. or gotten into trouble on the ramp with the strollers parked outside. I was outraged but the teacher didn't think it was a big deal. The director tried to spin her way out of it which was also pathetic.

The infant room had babies from 2 months up to 20 months so there is a pretty big range. I could not get a clear sense of the daily routine from the teachers. She was not very forthcoming when I asked about curriculum or activities for the older kids. They also do not provide any food (milk and baby food always comes from home but table food is provided at Innovation Station).

The tuition is $1800/month. They are NAEYC accredited but compared with what I see everyday at Innovation Station I was not impressed (I work in the building so I visit during the day).

I would not take my baby out of Innovation Station to attend Academy even though I would make more money and not have to spend close to 3 hours a day on Metro from Grosvenor to King Street. Her teachers there are amazing and the Center is very secure, clean and well-managed.

Maybe parents who have their kids there are very happy with it though. I only spent 30 minutes there and maybe my experience was not representative of what actually goes on there. It just gave me a scary vibe and I tend to go with my gut on these things

[Anonymous]

To the PP, I found your post to be very interesting. I recently visited the Academy at Stone Mill & had the same opinions.

[Anonymous]

I am the Director at the Stone Mill location and would like to know what you found there....

Thanks! : )

[Anonymous]

To 14:38 - The thing that bothered me most wasn't that it happened - accidents happen, although this one could have been easily avoided by keeping the door shut - but that no one seemed to be concerned. The director tried to explain that they let the kids outside for fresh air, sensory activities etc. This is all wonderful but the infants need to be supervised when they are outside, not simply allowed to roam free. I raised the issue of abduction and she just laughed saying that they are on the grounds of the elementary school. I would even worry about something simple like a bee sting. What if the child was allergic and got stung and no one even knew he was outside? I wonder if the director will inform the parents and take measures to avoid this in the future. I think reasonable people can tolerate mistakes as long as there is openness and willingness to take responsibility. I am sure that the teachers work hard and they did seem to be very kind to the children. Like I said, no place is perfect and mistakes do happen, but the response is important and that is what bothered me the most.

[Anonymous]

I understand your concerns. I would like to say though that we have a child in that room and we are extremely happy with his care. We had the opportunity to move him recently, to a daycare closer to us, but we declined because he is thriving in the infant room. A calendar of daily activities is emailed to us every month and they are very responsive to any questions we may have. My son feels safe, well cared for and barely notices us leaving when we drop him off because he feels so comfortable. We too do not like the building but we're more concerned with the intellectual, social and emotional development of our child than the four walls that surround him. The person who runs the room is extremely dedicated, experienced and truly understands children. I hope that as he grows and moves from room to room, his experiences will continue to be so positive. We cannot fault the care that he has received in the infant room to date.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I understand your concerns. I would like to say though that we have a child in that room and we are extremely happy with his care. We had the opportunity to move him recently, to a daycare closer to us, but we declined because he is thriving in the infant room. A calendar of daily activities is emailed to us every month and they are very responsive to any questions we may have. My son feels safe, well cared for and barely notices us leaving when we drop him off because he feels so comfortable. We too do not like the building but we're more concerned with the intellectual, social and emotional development of our child than the four walls that surround him. The person who runs the room is extremely dedicated, experienced and truly understands children. I hope that as he grows and moves from room to room, his experiences will continue to be so positive. We cannot fault the care that he has received in the infant room to date.

Do you know for sure that your baby is NOT crawling around alone outside?

[Anonymous]

Also, how old is your child? How do you know he feels safe and well-cared for? Is he old enough to tell you this? Otherwise, how could you possibly know?

[Anonymous]

I'm a dad of a 2-year-old who's still with the Coldspring Academy.

I also completely understand your concerns (11:37) because these are like my concerns when I firstly received my baby from the nurse's hand.

However, I do not agree with your opinion. I can't say I like everything there, but I'm very positive that the teachers there are fairly good and they are trying their best to take care of our kid---whatelse do I expect?

Human make mistakes: I always feel I can motivate the teachers more via encouraging than via complaining.

---just my 2 cents.

[Anonymous]

I am the Director at the Cold Spring Academy and I am proud to run an excellent child oriented program. Our program is located in a modular building on the grounds of Cold Spring Elementary School. We do have a heating and air conditioning system. We have extremely dedicated and experienced teachers at our school. I give several tours a day and we have an open door policy. You were informed before and after the tour that since our program is full, we will not be able to accept your child before May 2009. However you insisted to tour the program and said you really need the space since you will work from home.

Sensory play is an important part of our creative curriculum. The infant room has a back door that is connected to a wooden deck. The deck has a ramp with child safety gates on both sides. The children use this area for sensory play and outdoor activities. When you visited us at 10am it was outside time and the back door was open. There were two teachers in the room. As per your request one teacher was showing you the outside area, while the other teacher was preparing the children to go outside. As per the infant teacher’s explanation two children went outside while she was visually supervising them and preparing the third child for outside time. The second teacher immediately brought the children back in the room when she came inside with your family.

The tuition rates of our school are competitive. As per our health and safety policies we do not prepare bottles for infants. However we do provide breakfast and afternoon snack to older age groups. Children are our first priority and we are fortunate to have a great group of parents. These parents are fully aware that our environment is very safe and secure and there is no immediate danger of abduction. Although we have never seen a dog around the infant play area, we really appreciate your concern.

The parents at Cold Spring Academy trust us. I have personally forwarded your comments to all the infant room parents. We have nothing to hide and as always we welcome suggestions for improvement. I apologize to you if for any reason your experience at our school was not positive. I will give you a call in March 2009 to see if you are still interested in our program. Have a great weekend!

[Anonymous]

I am the person who took the tour.

I am not sure how this is relevant but I was aware that there were no slots until 2009 before the tour. I was told by the director that I should tour the center before I went on the waitlist. I am not in urgent need of care and am extremely happy with our current provider but knowing that it takes 1.5-2 years to get a slot in Bethesda and that I eventually want to work at home, I decided to go on the tour to begin to research our options for the future.

I was surprised that the director left the tour and asked the teacher talk to us when the teacher was clearly busy. It seems like it would have been better to have the director give the tour and to leave the teacher to tend to her normal classroom duties.

The incident that we observed may not be a big deal. It may also not be at all representative of what normally goes on at Academy. That being said, I think the director is misrepresenting the events of that morning.

At the beginning of our tour and before we discovered that the kids had escaped, I asked the teacher why the door was open. She said plainly that the door was open because the room is too hot otherwise and if they turn the heat down, it is too cold in other rooms in the center. She said nothing about outdoor play although we later discussed outdoor play being part of the daily routine for the infant room.

When we went outside to view the outdoor play area, the teacher was surprised to find the kids outside. It is therefore unlikely that she was planning on them going out for sensory play at that moment. The kids were not dressed for outdoor play and it was drizzling and cool.

To the person who wrote - how do you know your kid is not crawling around outside all day - that seems unfair. The teachers seemed very kind and I am sure that they work hard and that would have eventually noticed a couple of kids missing. I wasn’t overly impressed with the center but it was by no means bottom of the barrel child care and the pre-school rooms looked great based on our quick look as we passed through. The escaped toddlers may very well have been an isolated incident. I was only there for a few minutes and I am sure that the parents who leave their kids there know more about what is going on and how their kids feel about being there. If someone on a tour saw something funny in my daughter’s classroom, I would want to know about it though.

My comment about the modular nature of the building was made merely to illustrate that the door in the classroom was an exterior door. Intellectual and emotional development is of the highest importance. I am also concerned about safety and attitudes about safety.

We left upset about what we saw mostly because of the way the director tried to spin the situation with a discussion of sensory play. Of course sensory play is important but that wasn't what was going on. A mistake was made. The kids got out. They were recovered and no harm was done. But it could have been avoided and there should not have been a lot of spin.

I am not surprised that you know of no cases of abduction, dog attacks etc. but the point of safety protocols is to avoid worst case scenarios, however rare, by applying common sense. You can't protect against everything but keeping the door shut when you have a room of mobile infants is kind of a no-brainer, and would not have denied the kids the benefits of supervised outdoor sensory play.

[Anonymous]

Can you tell me how much you pay at USPTO and how long it took you to get in there (for an infant)? I am a federal employee in Alexandria, but not in that building.

[Anonymous]

I didn't see any escaped toddlers at Stone Mill but I did observe an older, heavy set woman just sitting on one of the playslides next to a baby strapped into a stroller. The other women was actively playing with all the other children while the other teacher just sat there. She could have at least held and played with the baby. You worry whether your child will have a fun active day or be placed in containers because one of the workers is not up to playing with the kids.