Busy Bees at Springfield Lakes

staff are neglectful, centre manager has poor leadership skills which reflect in the unhappiness of staff and high staff turnover Among many other issues the final straw for me was when another parent contacted me to let me know that she witnessed an educator, Paula, take my crying child away from me at drop off and proceeded to dump him on the ground and walk away, once I was out of sight. This parent told Paula that there was a crying child by himself around the corner, and Paula shrugged her shoulders, with no care in the world. I believe Paula was extremely neglectful towards my child, constantly leaving him in dirty nappies to the point of severe nappy rash. My child was the only one who didn’t have a designated pocket with his name on it, at the door. I mentioned this, in writing and it was ignored. I never received any artwork or memorabilia for his time at the centre. Paula claimed that my son ‘refused’ to partake in any of the activities. I find this very hard to believe, it’s my belief that he was intentionally excluded from activities. As an educator you should encourage the children to partake in activities, or do activities based on their individual interests. My son is extremely outgoing, loves painting, water play, trucks, sand, leaves, nature. All the fun stuff . But he was rarely photographed during the day and when I would ask how his day was, at pick up, id get the same robotic response from staff - “good.” He had bite marks on his back one day and when I asked what happened, Paula said she wasn’t sure. Another day when I picked my other son up he had a huge egg on his forehead. Paula told me he tripped over and fell onto a table, she even went as far to say that “he didn’t even cry when it happened” … the bruise was huge, so I find it completely unbelievable that he didn’t cry. Incident reports were never made for any of these events. It wasn’t just my child though, I came early one day and witnessed an educator screaming in a kindy boy’s face, the poor little guy looked absolutely terrified, and it broke my heart to see. During our time at the centre there was a huge amount of staff turnover, the lead educator in the kindy room only lasted 3 months there. I asked the centre manager Sally about all the changes and she had no real answer to give, reflecting her disengaged and ineffective leadership. The staff aren’t valued here and that directly affects the quality of care that the children receive. I always warn people about this centre, it was absolutely traumatising. I truly worry for the children that attend currently and hope they are all okay. If you’re considering sending your children here, please, look elsewhere.