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CONCERNING
OUR TRAININGS & CHILDREN
Even
though our trainings are not X-Rated they are for adults
only. We really do appreciate the number of child care
programs and in-home providers who attend our training workshops
and we really do understand the difficulty in getting away from
your program in the middle of the day, directly after closing in
the evening or attending during your weekend time. We do
appreciate the plans you make to cover family responsibilities
which includes arranging care for your own children in order to
attend trainings. Even with understanding this we need to
address a sensitive issue.
Recently
we have had many children at our trainings. We need to
again stress that it is very difficult to have children at our
training sessions for a number of reasons. First and
foremost is that we really consider our workshops and courses
professional development activities for adults. As such,
we want to offer an adult environment that is focused on the
material and discussions related to the topic. This is
very difficult to do when children are present. Second, it
is difficult for people to concentrate when children are
present. Sometimes the parents who bring their children
get distracted and sometimes the other participants become
distracted. Third, it is usually very difficult for
children to be at a training that lasts from two to five hours
long. Even adults need to wiggle and change positions, we
can hardly expect children to sit still and not make noise for
this amount of time. The bottom line is, it is not fair to the
trainer, the participants who paid for a professional workshop
or the children.
Often
people ask us if their children could stay in the kitchen or
another area of our building so they won't distract
anyone. This does not work because parents often worry
about their children so they excuse themselves to check on them
and the children poke their heads into the training area to
check on parents. Further, our building is usually
un-staffed during evening trainings which occur after business
hours and for liability reasons we can not have children
wandering through our offices.
Often
people bring their children and assure us that the children will
be well behaved and will cause no problems. Even though
this may be true, others will then assume there is no problem in
bringing children. It does not take long before we have a
situation where we have almost as many children as adults
attending workshops. This is then a problem for everyone.
Our
dilemma then becomes what can we do to make sure we are being
consistent, fair to everyone and meet the needs of people who
truly have such a hard time making arrangements for child care
while attending trainings. This leaves us with only one
approach: our
training sessions are for adults only and we must ask that
people not bring children to any workshop or course.
However,
if you have already signed up for a training and find yourself
in a situation where you would have to bring your children,
please call us to make other training arrangements. We can
place you in another class at a later date giving you more time
to search for child care. If you absolutely cannot make
child care arrangements, we may be able to offer you an
available on-site training program. We can come to your
program and train you right there. It takes a bit of
arranging but it can be done. If you need this option,
please call Margie at (315) 446-1220 ext. 312.
Above
all, we want you to get the training and professional
development you need and want. We appreciate the
arrangements you make to be here and we want to support you in
an adult environment. Thank you for helping us with this
difficult situation; we look forward to seeing you in our
workshops.
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