Corinna Bryant is a family child care home provider located in the Brooklyn Center neighborhood. Family child care homes have always been an important part of Cleveland’s early care and education system, but during the COVID-19 crisis, these providers have been an invaluable lifeline for families of essential workers. Because of their already small group sizes and consistency in the children enrolled and attending, these providers were able to continue to serve their families safely during the crisis.

Still, these providers had to be creative to adjust their policies and procedures to ensure the health and safety of the children and families they serve. Corinna wrote up her new policies, and says that her ongoing, open communication with families has been crucial during this time, especially because some of the changes happened so abruptly. When children arrive at her home, they have to take off their shoes, wash their hands, and get a temperature check before they enter. Corinna created a hand-washing station on her front porch using a drink dispenser and hand soap, added a seating are for parents to wait at a safe distance when dropping children off, created new procedures to ensure toys are sanitized after they are played with, and purchased masks with designs that young children would like to encourage them to wear masks.

Corinna decided to operate as a pandemic child care center because most of the families attending her program were essential workers, including an STNA, a registered nurse, and a grocery store supervisor. However, she also decided not to take on additional children during the pandemic to limit exposure to the children she serves.

She did have one child whose parent has been working from home and decided to keep the child home too. Corinna has continued to stay in touch with that family and child by sending materials to them and calling to check in regularly.

It’s no surprise that the pandemic has created new hardships for families, and Corinna is committed to providing the kids and families she serves with the resources they need. When one parent recently lost her job, Corinna got to work connecting the family to resources for rent and utilities and food support.

She is also focused on reinforcing the learning and health and safety procedures from her program into the children’s homes. Corinna has sent home soap with instructions about how to properly wash your hands and a book and other resources about the importance of wearing masks. Once things began to open back up, Corinna reminded parents about the importance of keeping up with well-checks and immunizations.

While the pandemic has changed the way many things are done in her program, Corinna is committed to continuing as many of her special activities as possible. She still put on her annual carnival this year, but the parents didn’t attend. She had one child who was moving to kindergarten this fall and held a much smaller preschool graduation with safety precautions in place so that child and their family could still celebrate the milestone.

Corinna says that what’s gotten her through is that her families have been supporting her and she’s been supporting them. And she doesn’t expect things to change any time soon. When asked about her plans for the future, she said, “Stay safe, stay the course.”

Pictured above: Corinna’s front porch with new seating area, hand-washing station, and health and safety reminders.