Latest / ChildCare Conversations / 362: The Hidden Financial Impact of Quality Ratings Nobody Tells You About with Coach Rae
Transcript
- 0:00Childcare Conversations: Welcome to Child Care Conversations, the podcast where early childhood leaders like you get real-world strategies, honest talk, and a whole lot of support.
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- 0:41Childcare Conversations: Now, let's get into today's conversation.
- 0:44Childcare Conversations: One we think you're really going to love.
- 0:47Kate Woodward Young: Welcome back to Childcare Conversations, and I am so glad that you're joining me.
- 0:51Kate Woodward Young: And today my co-host is Coach Ray, and we are so excited to have a conversation and do some myth busting.
- 1:01Kate Woodward Young: I kind of like that idea today.
- 1:03Kate Woodward Young: So, Ray, tell us a little bit about how you got into the industry and um then we'll just kind of jump in and get started.
- 1:13SPEAKER_01: Sure, Kate.
- 1:14SPEAKER_01: Thank you for having me.
- 1:16SPEAKER_01: Um, I love that we're already so connected.
- 1:18SPEAKER_01: So I think this makes it super easy for us.
- 1:22SPEAKER_01: Um, I would say, so this is my 16th year in education.
- 1:28SPEAKER_01: I have taught in early and in a lot of sectors.
- 1:33SPEAKER_01: So Head Start, I've done private, and I'll say currently how I was able to get to my role is I really was always searching for a career trajectory that felt the most like me.
- 1:49SPEAKER_01: I think a lot of the times we see that the normal hierarchy in our field is you're a teacher, you do well, you show some intangibleness of leadership skills, and then you're an assistant director, right?
- 2:06SPEAKER_01: And then maybe you're a director, and then maybe you say I want to own my center.
- 2:10SPEAKER_01: I wanted to do none of those things.
- 2:16SPEAKER_01: So I was like, what is a good career trajectory for me that I felt that was the most authentic?
- 2:24SPEAKER_01: So I was in early Head Start and Head Start.
- 2:28SPEAKER_01: I've always traditionally taught pre-K.
- 2:31SPEAKER_01: And I was I saw a coach and I was like, that's it.
- 2:36SPEAKER_01: I it was like a light bulb went off, the epiphany came, and I said, this is what I want to do.
- 2:44SPEAKER_01: I want to be able to support teachers and give them the skills to build the relationship and give them that support that either they did have and they want more of, or a lot of times what they didn't have, which seems to be unfortunately the trend in our field.
- 3:04SPEAKER_01: So currently I am an early care and education specialist for a local child care resource and referral agency.
- 3:12SPEAKER_01: And I also have my own consulting venture called Hey Coach Ray, where I am, I like to say, uh trainer and speaker extraordinaire.
- 3:24SPEAKER_01: So that's me in a nutshell.
- 3:26Kate Woodward Young: I love that.
- 3:27Kate Woodward Young: I love that.
- 3:28Kate Woodward Young: Well, I loved what you said about finding a career path that was authentic to you.
- 3:34Kate Woodward Young: I think that if nobody hears anything else out of today's episode, I think that that is so key because being an instructional coach versus being uh an you know a you know an assistant director versus being a curriculum coordinator or whether or not you stay in a small program or a Head Start or a school district or you go and work for a large corporation or even a franchise's home office, right?
- 4:04Kate Woodward Young: So like there's all kinds of really cool paths that you're right aren't things that people generally wake up one day and go, I want to be, because we don't have it lined out.
- 4:16Kate Woodward Young: And so I really appreciate you kind of talking about that whole uh being authentic and and identifying, you know, how you found your career path.
- 4:27Kate Woodward Young: So as, hey Coach Ray, I want to have a little talk.
- 4:30Kate Woodward Young: Because are you open to doing some myth busting with me today?
- 4:33Kate Woodward Young: Very much so.
- 4:34Kate Woodward Young: We have to bust these myths back on.
- 4:37Kate Woodward Young: I love that.
- 4:38Kate Woodward Young: I love that.
- 4:38Kate Woodward Young: So one of the things that we're gonna talk about in in part of this myth busting um episode is quality rating systems.
- 4:48Kate Woodward Young: So a lot of states have quality rating systems.
- 4:52Kate Woodward Young: There are uh quality rating systems that are affiliated with accreditations, like everybody seems to have one.
- 5:00Kate Woodward Young: Tell me a little bit about like the difference in some of them.
- 5:04Kate Woodward Young: And, you know, let's start with that first myth after that.
- 5:08Kate Woodward Young: So tell me a little bit about maybe the purpose of some of the rating systems and maybe what to look for or to think about when you're actually choosing, or maybe it's being chosen for you, um, a rating system.
- 5:22SPEAKER_01: So I think when you think about quality rating systems, I would say being um, I would say aligned with uh childcare resource and referral agency, a lot of times it automatically gets a bad rap.
- 5:37SPEAKER_01: It's like you're coming in, you're trying to tell me what to do, you want to take away the autonomous nature of my classroom.
- 5:47SPEAKER_01: I don't like it.
- 5:48SPEAKER_01: I was a teacher that saw it and was like, okay, now what is this you're trying to do?
- 5:53SPEAKER_01: And you're trying to tell me how I need to teach.
- 5:56SPEAKER_01: And you're gonna come in with your clipboard or your notepad or your scoring sheet and circle all of these numbers and add all this stuff together and tell me what I do in my class.
- 6:08SPEAKER_01: I know what I do in my class, and I'm saying this from experience.
- 6:11SPEAKER_01: I hear this from a lot of teachers, but I think what is what is important to note is that in life, you always have to have levels of accountability.
- 6:22SPEAKER_01: And quality rating systems are really just an accountability piece, and when you're able to really understand the true nature of them and understand whether it, whether it's it's echers, or you know, more people are using a class tool and understanding what their objective really is, and not just simply looking at it as it being tied to funding for your center.
- 6:50SPEAKER_01: That's important, right?
- 6:51SPEAKER_01: I understand it.
- 6:52SPEAKER_01: Look, times are hard, y'all.
- 6:54SPEAKER_01: It's hard out here in these streets.
- 6:56SPEAKER_01: So I know you want to do well to get that funding, but I think really delving deep into why these systems were made and how they really, really can be used to be a benefit to your center is what will really help you kind of bust the myth of feeling like it's up with some of the GRA systems.
- 7:18Kate Woodward Young: Absolutely.
- 7:19Kate Woodward Young: So I think you you said one thing that I just wanted to kind of grab real quick, which is that whole money piece, because you know, we got owners and directors that are listening, and we all know that if your quality rating system is real is is connected to any sort of your funding or subsidy, this is going on in your head.
- 7:39Kate Woodward Young: Like all you can think about.
- 7:41Kate Woodward Young: And I think the big disconnect, having been a director of a program that had a heavy subsidy, um, and we were accredited by choice at the time.
- 7:50Kate Woodward Young: We were part of the quality rating system, and at the time in Texas, it was by choice, it wasn't a mandate.
- 7:56Kate Woodward Young: Um but now a lot of times it's becoming mandated, right?
- 8:01Kate Woodward Young: So there's that pushback automatic.
- 8:03Kate Woodward Young: I don't want to because you're telling me how to do it.
- 8:06Kate Woodward Young: But I think there's a real disconnect for the staff related to that reimbursement rate.
- 8:13Kate Woodward Young: So are you running into it, Ray, where you've got folks who are a little like, I don't want to do this, but they don't really understand the financial impact of the quality rating system?
- 8:23Kate Woodward Young: Like, do you see that in your school?
- 8:27SPEAKER_01: Definitely, Kate.
- 8:28SPEAKER_01: I would say a lot in my state, I'm seeing the disconnect between the teachers truly understanding what it all entails.
- 8:37SPEAKER_01: And I would say this kind of connects to the lack of communication between like the teacher and the admin, because admin gives really a lot of bare bones explanation as to why I've gone in centers, and the director is just like, yeah, so the class observer is coming out and you have to get a six.
- 9:03SPEAKER_01: There's no step-by-step on how to get this six per se.
- 9:08SPEAKER_01: There's no, this is the rationale behind it.
- 9:11SPEAKER_01: And I think just as people, right, you think about adult learners versus kid learners.
- 9:17SPEAKER_01: I think even with kid learners, so we want to know like the rationale behind things.
- 9:22SPEAKER_01: Okay, this person is coming in and they're coming in an evaluative nature.
- 9:27SPEAKER_01: I know for my teachers, I don't like to sugarcoat it.
- 9:30SPEAKER_01: I'm not like, oh, they're look, they're coming in to evaluate you.
- 9:34SPEAKER_01: You know, I we're gonna work together so that you know what you're doing, but they're coming in to evaluate you.
- 9:41SPEAKER_01: So I think having those conversations and letting them know, hey, they're coming in to do this, but what do we have to do to mitigate you feeling unprepared?
- 9:52SPEAKER_01: We get in front of it, we have our trainings, we have, and I like to say, very um curated trainings on these particular topics or dimensions that you may be having a little bit of struggle in so that you don't feel blindsided, and also explain to them like the the financial tie to it.
- 10:15SPEAKER_01: That's mostly what I mean.
- 10:18SPEAKER_01: Like they they don't explain the financial tie, but as admin, like you said, that is spinning in their mind.
- 10:25SPEAKER_01: They're like, okay, and um I'm a New Orleans native, so I know in Louisiana it is tied to a lot of funding for the centers based on your particular composite store.
- 10:38SPEAKER_01: So, of course, as an owner, even if I don't understand the intricacies of a quality rating system, what I do understand is that I need this store to get this money.
- 10:52SPEAKER_01: So now, okay, so let's so let's talk.
- 10:54Kate Woodward Young: I'm gonna pause right there.
- 10:55Kate Woodward Young: Beep.
- 10:56Kate Woodward Young: Okay, so here's one of the things that I think gets missed.
- 11:01Kate Woodward Young: Because I find owners and directors don't think staff need to understand that.
- 11:07Kate Woodward Young: Totally.
- 11:09Kate Woodward Young: They try to hide the profit and loss statements.
- 11:12Kate Woodward Young: Well, here's the thing when you hide it, that means you got everybody doing what I call envelope math, right?
- 11:18Kate Woodward Young: So they're counting the kids in the room and they know what your website says your rate is.
- 11:23Kate Woodward Young: And so they think you're making a ton of money because you're not paying them worth squats.
- 11:27Kate Woodward Young: Because they don't understand all the expenses.
- 11:29SPEAKER_01: Yes.
- 11:30Kate Woodward Young: But they also may not understand that not every state's reimbursement is at the published rate.
- 11:38Kate Woodward Young: Right?
- 11:38Kate Woodward Young: So if your if your reimbursement rate is say eighty percent and all of a sudden you can take it to 82 or 83 percent because of a quality score, I'm sorry, I'm going to tell you as somebody who trains directors, and I train directors and owners all the time, you need to share those numbers with your staff.
- 12:01Kate Woodward Young: Get them in a staff.
- 12:03Kate Woodward Young: You know, get the get the numbers out on the table because first of all, they think you're your your you know, your internet expense is$70 a month, meanwhile, you're writing a check for$350 to$400 every month for the internet so that you can have the parent communication app.
- 12:19Kate Woodward Young: You know, so like it's like they don't understand.
- 12:22Kate Woodward Young: They don't they don't understand all the other expenses, but you haven't stopped as a director or an owner to share it.
- 12:28Kate Woodward Young: So if you're an owner and you're listening and you've got any staff who are remotely not sure that a quality rating system is something that they want to do because of exactly the first myth we busted, which was related to, you know, they want to control you.
- 12:45Kate Woodward Young: Well, they don't want to control you.
- 12:46Kate Woodward Young: That's not the goal here at all.
- 12:48Kate Woodward Young: So it's not about control.
- 12:50Kate Woodward Young: Um, it is going to be about money.
- 12:52Kate Woodward Young: So that is a myth that we did not bust because it is 100% about money in almost every state.
- 12:59Kate Woodward Young: But because if it's not about the money, it's about the accreditation, which comes down to the money.
- 13:05Kate Woodward Young: It's all about the money, right?
- 13:07Kate Woodward Young: Pull out that monopoly money.
- 13:09Kate Woodward Young: And if you don't want to give them real numbers, give them pretty close approximates.
- 13:13Kate Woodward Young: Yeah.
- 13:14Kate Woodward Young: But if you're not, they're gonna do the math on their own and they're not gonna get it right.
- 13:18Kate Woodward Young: And so they don't understand that you're operating on probably a 12% margin.
- 13:24Kate Woodward Young: You know, there's there there's not a lot of room for a busted air conditioner, and us in the south, we need those air conditioners to be working, right?
- 13:31Kate Woodward Young: And so you know, I had a program that had to put 31,000 into her building's air conditioner.
- 13:37Kate Woodward Young: Wow.
- 13:38Kate Woodward Young: And like and the staff were mad they didn't get a raise that year.
- 13:42Kate Woodward Young: Wow.
- 13:43SPEAKER_01: $31,000.
- 13:45Kate Woodward Young: $31,000.
- 13:47Kate Woodward Young: And, you know, she'd been in the business for for for over 32 years.
- 13:50Kate Woodward Young: And she's like, I guess I should probably start thinking about an exit strategy.
- 13:53Kate Woodward Young: And I looked at her and I said, I think that would have been good about 18 months ago, because now you gotta like you got a$31,000 air conditioner you gotta figure out how to process.
- 14:03Kate Woodward Young: But you know, she she the staff, like she had some staff leave because they weren't gonna get their annual their annual raise.
- 14:10Kate Woodward Young: And I said, Did you sit down and explain to them how much that air conditioner cost you?
- 14:15Kate Woodward Young: I said, I think you need to sit down and give them the numbers.
- 14:18Kate Woodward Young: You know, I mean, and she's like, Well, it's it's my business.
- 14:21Kate Woodward Young: And I went, Yeah.
- 14:22Kate Woodward Young: But they're doing envelope math.
- 14:23Kate Woodward Young: And so they think and even if they've had to replace an air conditioner at home, they're probably going, Oh, it's like five thousand dollars.
- 14:30Kate Woodward Young: But your air conditioner was six times what a home air conditioner is.
- 14:36Kate Woodward Young: You know, so I'm like going anyway.
- 14:38Kate Woodward Young: So let's think about these other myths.
- 14:40Kate Woodward Young: What are some other myths, Ray, that that pop up that you hear a lot other than they want to control it or it's all about the money?
- 14:48Kate Woodward Young: What's another, like almost like I I think one that I've heard, and you tell me, and I'm gonna let you bust this myth, it's too complicated.
- 14:56SPEAKER_01: Let me tell you, when you crack the code, it is not complicated at all.
- 15:04SPEAKER_01: I think for again, for a lot of teachers, when it's brought to them and it's just, I'm gonna be honest, it feels like a hodgepodge of high-level wording and numbers and letters, and you're like, wait, hold up.
- 15:20SPEAKER_01: This is not ABC's level.
- 15:22SPEAKER_01: What you trying to say?
- 15:23Kate Woodward Young: You mean it sounds a little too academic and not necessarily written for the end user.
- 15:28SPEAKER_01: Exactly, right?
- 15:30SPEAKER_01: And and when you're seeing this as a teacher, you're like, and I feel like because a lot of our teachers are already like, okay, now you're giving me another thing to do on the laundry list of things that I already have to do.
- 15:44SPEAKER_01: So some of them are not as open-minded or receptive to wanting to actually see what it's about and see that quite a few of these things you are already doing in your classroom is just about putting the verbiage with what you already do and understanding how to do it at either a higher level or how to just put the words to the action.
- 16:13SPEAKER_01: And that's what they're commanded to do.
- 16:15Kate Woodward Young: That is a great way.
- 16:16Kate Woodward Young: So, so really what we need are translators, and I know that's one of the things that you actually do.
- 16:22Kate Woodward Young: You actually help administrators and teachers kind of find each other and and figure out how to meet and how to collaborate and how to have a real conversation.
- 16:32Kate Woodward Young: Tell me a little bit about what that looks like and how that might help programs that are trying to change their quality rating scores.
- 16:40Kate Woodward Young: How can you help the administrators and the teachers communicate?
- 16:44SPEAKER_01: Say first, Kate.
- 16:45SPEAKER_01: What I tend to see a lot in the centers is um I was I was telling a fellow colleague like this, Pinky and the Brain Syndrome.
- 16:55SPEAKER_01: You have the brain, it's the owner or the director, and they're like the same thing I do every night, Pinky.
- 17:02SPEAKER_01: Try to take over the world.
- 17:04SPEAKER_01: Meanwhile, the Pinkies of the world are just following along, but the communication is like this.
- 17:14SPEAKER_01: There's this huge gap because they're following you, but they really don't know exactly what you want from them.
- 17:22SPEAKER_01: So when I go into centers, a lot of what I'm doing is making sure that I speak to M and directors and let them know about truly how to be transparent, which you spoke on a huge deal in our conversation, and also how to really build a relationship to make people feel comfortable in order to want to collaborate.
- 17:47SPEAKER_01: If I don't feel comfortable with you, I'm gonna be very skittish.
- 17:52SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna be very pensive and very hesitant about really wanting to collaborate with you and also making sure that there's no, I like to say, pseudo-collaboration going on where I'm coming in and I'm saying I want to be able to communicate and collaborate and do this together.
- 18:11SPEAKER_01: But what I really mean is I want you to have no autonomy and I really just want you to do what I want you to do.
- 18:18SPEAKER_01: So when I go in, I make sure that teachers and admin alike understand that there has to be a level of openness and transparency for both sides.
- 18:31SPEAKER_01: I'll give a quick story of something that I'm kind of in the midst of right now.
- 18:35SPEAKER_01: I actually have a center that abruptly changed owners.
- 18:40SPEAKER_01: The owner, one owner, had been the owner for about five years.
- 18:44SPEAKER_01: She came in about three weeks ago and told them, hey, I sold the center, you're gonna get a new owner.
- 18:52SPEAKER_01: The first thoughts I had were, wow, wow, this is abrupt.
- 18:56SPEAKER_01: I had teachers calling me, coach Ray, we don't know who this person is coming in.
- 19:01SPEAKER_01: We don't trust them.
- 19:03SPEAKER_01: We're about to put in our notices, actually.
- 19:06SPEAKER_01: Thankfully, I was able to talk to a colleague who knew the incoming owner.
- 19:11SPEAKER_01: I was able to get her information and really speak to her to let her know how to get in front of like that collaborative effort.
- 19:19SPEAKER_01: I was like have a meeting with them, actually speak to them individually, let them know your vision, but also hear from them.
- 19:28SPEAKER_01: And it was a huge help.
- 19:30SPEAKER_01: They were able actually to keep all of the staff there.
- 19:34SPEAKER_01: They were like super open.
- 19:36SPEAKER_01: They're like, Poe Trey, we're open.
- 19:39SPEAKER_01: Now we're not telling you it's we're gonna stay here forever, but we are open.
- 19:43SPEAKER_01: And that's what you need, right?
- 19:45SPEAKER_01: You need that opening.
- 19:46SPEAKER_01: Nobody's saying that this is gonna be the fix-it-all.
- 19:51SPEAKER_01: But you need that opening because you never know what can happen if you just give that person a chance to be able to show you what you can do.
- 19:59SPEAKER_01: But without that conversation, they were like, I'm not doing this because I don't know this person.
- 20:06SPEAKER_01: I don't trust them.
- 20:07SPEAKER_01: And I'm not even open to wanting to collaborate with this owner director because of how we felt like it was done.
- 20:16SPEAKER_01: But by her just being proactive and coming in and saying, hey, I want to hear from y'all, I'm I'm coming into something that y'all already had established as a teaching team.
- 20:27SPEAKER_01: So let me know what y'all need from me as well.
- 20:30Kate Woodward Young: Love that.
- 20:31Kate Woodward Young: And I think that that is a great piece of advice for any owner or director who's listening.
- 20:36Kate Woodward Young: If you come into an organization for the first time, take some pause, go connect with your resource and referral agency, go connect with your licensing folks, your TRS, your rising star mentors, whatever your state calls that role, go find those folks, uh, connect with them with your staff.
- 20:57Kate Woodward Young: Don't do this in a silo because you're gonna lose those staff.
- 21:00Kate Woodward Young: And I think that um, although that wasn't one of our myths, I think that's huge in the fact that a lot of times owners and directors think they can just kind of come in and it's not going to be that big of a deal.
- 21:13Kate Woodward Young: And um just like children, you got to build that no like and trust.
- 21:17Kate Woodward Young: And if I don't know you and I don't like you, I ain't gonna trust you.
- 21:20Kate Woodward Young: And guess what?
- 21:22Kate Woodward Young: This was absolutely an example of a no-like and trust situation that could have gone really, really bad.
- 21:27Kate Woodward Young: So, Ray, thank you so much for sharing that story and and helping those who are listening maybe get a little less fear about using quality rating systems.
- 21:37Kate Woodward Young: And if folks want to get a hold of you, your um all your websites, all your LinkedIn, all your IG, all your contact information is in the show notes.
- 21:47Kate Woodward Young: So if you would like Coach Ray to come and and support your program, um, you don't have to be in Louisiana.
- 21:55Kate Woodward Young: Uh Coach Ray will come and support you anywhere in the country.
- 21:59Kate Woodward Young: Uh, Coach Ray has a lot of experience with the class rating system.
- 22:04Kate Woodward Young: Um, but uh it doesn't really matter the actual initials of the rating system because a lot of it is helping you develop the confidence into the language.
- 22:13Kate Woodward Young: And I love that Coach Ray is here to help you translate.
- 22:17Kate Woodward Young: So, with that, don't forget to um go to the website, childcareconversations.com.
- 22:24Kate Woodward Young: If you're not already on the newsletter, subscribe to the newsletter, and we look forward to having a conversation with you in a few days.
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