Kent Island Bright Beginnings

"We absolutely LOVE Bright Beginnings! The staff are friendly and clearly passionate about kids. The Director is knowledgeable and responsive. Our primary interactions have been on the infant side, as our daughter is under a year old. She ADORES her teacher and we do, too. Ms. Colleen is incredibly attentive and creative (she comes up with the cutest crafts!). She keeps our curious 8-month old engaged and stimulated. My husband and I have both been impressed by how much our daughter has grown in the almost three months she’s been at Bright Beginnings (BB). She had a serious case of bottle refusal when she started. BB staff worked with us and our daughter to overcome her refusal and now she drinks from the bottle like a pro! They also send daily updates detailing what gross motor, fine motor, and communication skills were worked on and are great about sending pics, keeping us in the loop when our wild one, who’s determined to crawl, takes a tumble, and communicating about upcoming events, holiday closures, etc. Worth every penny considering how excited our daughter gets to go to school and how reassured my husband and I feel knowing how well cared for she is at BB."

"Our son has been attending KIBB for a year now. The teachers are wonderful and he has learned so much during his time there. Miss Patrae, Miss Sierra, and Miss Colleen are outstanding, and all the staff members we’ve interacted with have been friendly and welcoming. They truly, sincerely care about the kids and it shows. Our son is excited to go to school every morning and when we pick him up he’s excited to tell us about his day. We’re so glad we found KIBB and we’re proud to have our child be a part of this school."

"Our child has been going here for a month now and the experience has been amazing! This is our first child and we were nervous to start child care, to say the least. Petrae made us feel so comfortable and assured us everything would be ok. She had already sent us a text message with a picture of our baby girl just 15 minutes after we dropped her off to let us know how she was adjusting. She did this throughout the entire day. The staff is REALLY good about keeping families updated throughout the day (through the ProCare app) with pics, milestones, meals, bathroom breaks, etc. In addition, they also do a great job with personalizing their approach to teaching with each individual child. They understand that each child learns differently and they adjust their methods accordingly. Lastly and most importantly…they are all just good people. I’m sure it’s not easy being with kids all day. But the staff greets the parents with the same genuine smile on their faces at the end of the day as they do in the beginning. This goes a long way and has more of an impact than some people realize. We could not be happier with this place and hope other parents read this and understand just how much these people care about providing a good (and safe) environment/experience for families."

"My child was in care at this center for a little under a year. At first I thought my concerns were that of a new mom with an infant in the care of another person but over time, more and more horrific things have come to light. The owner has a history of changing business names and locations and she doesn’t even go by her legally given name, at the time of posting the current business is not in good standing with the state due to her failure to complete annual paperwork, she doesn’t follow her own contract, and randomly all of the negative reviews posted are removed within a timely manner to avoid others from seeing it. The facility itself is not accessible to parents and they are made to wait outside in all weather and unable to contact anyone by phone, they are frequently out of ratio, new staff are not introduced to parents, children have been left outside unsupervised, and good staff are fired because they stand up for what’s right and don’t just fall in line with what the owner says. The owner makes decisions and then is not accessible to parents and instead makes her teachers (who have no clue what is going on) face the parents. As a parent I was told that there was a waitlist of 140 kids (so basically it was fine if i wanted to leave) and then the next day was offered free tuition until I was able to make other arrangements. What business would keep children for free? That makes zero sense. There is a history of businesses associated with the owner being closed abruptly leaving parents to scramble to make arrangements for their children. We also had a lot of small inconveniences such as wasted bottles, a can of wasted formula, missing supplies, and my personal favorite- my son having another child’s pacifier in his mouth at pickup! We had been made to pick up on one occasion because he had a “temperature” while sleeping despite my personal thermometer not showing a fever when I picked him up. I immediately took him to the pediatrician who confirmed he had no such temperature. I’ve been informed certain staff have been restricted access to parts of the center and the current acting director is not qualified to run the center. With the loss of the last director (3 in a year!), the center has really gone down hill and I 100% advise to avoid the headache and nightmare that comes with this place. Also- I’ll save you some time and research- most of the positive reviews here are from the owners husband (biased), personal friend (biased) and a current employee (once again- biased). None which are parents with children enrolled or previously enrolled in the program therefore unreliable and just an attempt to increase their rating and cancel out the negative but honest reviews."

"A few months ago I thought we had the best child care center. However that quickly changed when their director suddenly left in April. That was the third director to leave with no notice in a year. Since that director left I’ve been struggling with a list of concerns, mostly in relation to the owner and interim director Petrae. One night around 9pm all families got a message that the concept of the daycare was changing and classes would be cut down in size by 2/3. With this change came a significant increase in tuition, however neither of these individuals would answer messages in regards to the amount. I’m assuming that the size was decreasing due to Petrae not legally being qualified to run a daycare of the current size. There have been several last minute closings recently. I attempted to find out the schedule for the week of 4th of July and Petrae ignored my message, then at pick up I was told no one knew when someone would have an answer for me. 4th of July was three weeks away and they didn’t know the schedule yet. That same day another mom made it known to Petrae that her and I had been communicating in regards to our concerns. The next morning we both woke up to a message from Petrae that the owner wants to give us free tuition until we find new care. I found that very odd. I contacted the state, who confirmed they are not reporting when staff members are leaving or fired so who knows if their ratios were correct. The last two weeks there has been several staff members fired. From what I’ve been told it seems anyone who has a different opinion than these two get fired on the spot. The owner is constantly changing between two names she goes by, and her other businesses are also always changing names. I gave my written two week notice but was told it was waived and we could leave at any time. My child’s teacher was out this past week and for the first time in months Petrae had a completely different schedule charted. I wasn’t concerned until she came home and went through a yogurt pouch, several snacks and an extra bottle. She usually doesn’t eat until bedtime after daycare. Some of our premade formula was not sent home and I sent a message (there is no direct phone to the center) so I could come pick it up, Petrae did not answer me until almost 9pm. The next day our lead teacher was suddenly fired. I decided to pull my child out at that time due to almost a complete staff turn over in the last several months and having absolutely no clue who is caring for them while at the center. I sent Petrae a message that we would not be returning and within 2 minutes got a response back saying “she’s all packed up:)” Extremely unprofessional in my opinion. Management has absolutely ruined this facility and it’s such a shame. I only wish other parents would have voiced their concerns before we enrolled. However, all negative reviews are deleted off google within a timely manner. The positive reviews on here and fb are all made by individuals who have close relationships to the owner. Luckily through this situation we were able to build some great relationships with amazing teachers."