Federal civil servants in New York City are organized with other parents to protect the quality and continuity of childcare by supporting the interests of the teachers and staff at Bright Horizons locations across the city. Here IFPTE Local 98 proudly supports and publishes this letter as part of our commitment to our members and our community.
Parents' Open Letter to Bright Horizons
June, 2020
Dear Stephen Kramer, Chief Executive Officer; Elizabeth Boland, Chief Financial Officer; and David H. Lissy, Executive Chairman of the Board of Directors at Bright Horizons,
We are a contingent of parents with children enrolled at Bright Horizons in New York City. We write to express our grave concern about Bright Horizons’ failure to support its staff in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. Earlier this year, Bright Horizons required all New York staff to work at centers for two weeks after the governor had declared a state of emergency, and it announced its plan to eliminate their pay well before the federal government guaranteed adequate unemployment benefits. Staff remain uninformed about Bright Horizons’ plans for reopening and uncertain about the future of their pay, their benefits, and their job security.
Given Bright Horizons’ recent and ongoing failures, we seek concrete assurances that Bright Horizons will protect our children’s caretakers from medical and economic threats as long as the pandemic and its fallout continue. Bright Horizons CEO Stephen Kramer recently released a statement calling for all “individuals who care” to “join the fight to ensure all people share the same opportunities, privilege, respect and freedoms.” But this call for solidarity is at odds with Bright Horizons’ treatment of its staff, particularly in response to the COVID-19 crisis. Bright Horizons’ recent public statements in support of protestors ring hollow absent meaningful action to protect its employees, who, in New York City whereour children are enrolled, are disproportionately Black and other people of color.
Our fear for the consequences of Bright Horizons’ actions is twofold: we are troubled by the implications for the long-term health and stability of our centers, and we are distressed about the safety and livelihood of the teachers and administrative staff whom we care for deeply.
When we learned that Bright Horizons made the decision to stop paying its employees their regular income in the first week of April, we were shocked to realize that the two safety nets available to them would be individual classroom collections and public assistance. At the time, public assistance would have been dramatically inadequate to meet their basic, daily needs; even after Congress passed the CARES Act, the Labor Department has been unable to disburse funds in a timely manner to the record millions of people filing for unemployment benefits due to the crisis brought about by COVID-19, putting our administrators and staff in a precarious financial position. And Bright Horizons has not facilitated its staff’s access to the benefits that are available. For example, it has not ensured that employees staffing centers for essential workers know about the unemployment benefits to which they are entitled, allowing teachers to work in life-threatening conditions while receiving less pay than they would if they remained unemployed. With Bright Horizons touting “thirty-plus years showing the world how to champion for working families,” it is unfathomable that Bright Horizons should abandon its staff in a moment of crisis and, at best, expect the parent community to shoulder the responsibility of filling in the gaps that Bright Horizons created.
Bright Horizons has built a strong reputation on how well it cares for its employees. We share in the company’s stated concerns for employees, which is why the parent community at just one center raised tens of thousands of dollars to tide teachers over when neither the company nor the government was paying them. Bright Horizons boasts over 175 Fortune 500 companies among its 1,150+ clients, some of which have stepped in to compensate employees while Bright Horizons, as a corporate entity, has not.
As a publicly traded company with $2.062B in revenue last year, Bright Horizons generates substantial earnings for its shareholders and has maintained a healthy profit margin from 2018-2019. From 2018 to 2019, the company’s net income increased 14% to $18MM. In the past two years, the company has bought back over $150MM of shares from stockholders, including its own executives, and listed $228MM+ in total current assets as of December 31, 2019, illustrating that Bright Horizons has a hefty pool of cash on hand that it will use in the interest of strengthening existing shareholder value. These publicly available documents that attest to Bright Horizons’ healthy financial position indicate that the company has significant cash reserves to sustain unforeseen hits to revenue, such as the current COVID-19 pandemic.
We are aware that Bright Horizons executives and board members are forgoing some of their compensation, as reported by The Boston Globe. More importantly, we recognize and appreciate that Bright Horizons has adopted several meaningful measures to protect its employees. For example, Bright Horizons has until now continued to provide employees with access to their ordinary health coverage, and teachers received two weeks of pay after the centers closed. These measures have been essential to staff members’ welfare.
But these measures follow Bright Horizons’ decisions to require teachers to continue working well into March when it had become unsafe, and to cease paying its center administrators and teachers when they had no reliable prospect of alternative, adequate sources of income. Bright Horizons provided no, or dramatically inadequate, information and assistance to teachers regarding access to unemployment benefits; as a result, many--including those staffing Bright Horizons’ centers for essential workers’ children--have foregone thousands of dollars in badly needed income. Many teachers cannot afford the health care plans that have been offered to them, and even those who can have no guarantee that their access to coverage will continue. Staff has been provided with very little information about the company’s plans for reopening centers, continuing their employment, ensuring their health and safety upon reopening, or assisting them financially if and when the CARES Act expires. More broadly, these are conditions created by a company that, in the best economic circumstances, fails by many measures to pay a living wage to the center staff and administrators who are the very backbone, and the heart, of the Bright Horizons community. The average Bright Horizons employee earns an annual income of $23,969. Even in New York City, where staff wages are higher, associate teachers make less than $35,000 per year, deemed a poverty salary for those trying to raise a family. Meanwhile, total compensation for executive officers and board members exceeded $10MM in the 2018 fiscal year. Collectively, yearly compensation for Bright Horizons’ executives could pay the annual salaries of 422 Bright Horizons staff members.
Against this backdrop, we believe that recent partial executive pay cuts are not meaningful indications of a company as dedicated to protecting employees as maximizing shareholders’ profit. Further, we hope the benefits protection offered by Bright Horizons will remain in place as its valuable employees face the crisis of how to pay their bills and rent, feed their families, and stay afloat.
The benefits of the CARES Act expire in July. If they are not renewed, and/or Bright Horizons ceases to provide benefits while employment continues to be affected by COVID-19, teachers left without sufficient resources to support themselves and their families will suffer. They will also be forced to explore other employment options. As a result, Bright Horizons will experience significant attrition, leaving our children with unfamiliar faces when they finally return to their classrooms. Consistency and stability for our children are more important than ever before in these wildly destabilizing times, and we do not want to see our cherished Bright Horizons leaders and teachers depart because they have been left with no other choice. Consistency and stability is even more important for staff, many of whom have dedicated their careers to educating our children and supporting our families.
As the nation’s second largest provider of employer-sponsored child care and as a FORTUNE “100 Best Places to Work,” Bright Horizons is in a uniquely powerful position to lead by example, setting the standard as a corporate citizen to show other organizations how to support employees during an unprecedented global emergency, and to show its customers that it cares about their families and the families of the teachers and staff who have helped to raise their children.
We therefore call on Bright Horizons to commit to the following:
In addition, once Bright Horizons has provided for staff to survive the present emergency, we look forward to a broader discussion about Bright Horizons’ specific plans to “join the fight to ensure all people share the same opportunities, privilege, respect and freedoms” by offering its staff appropriate and dignified wages commensurate with their skill, dedication, and importance in the lives of Bright Horizons’ students.
We expect Bright Horizons to relay a strong statement to our parent community: that Bright Horizons stands behind its administrators and teachers, honoring their critical importance in shaping the minds and hearts of our children. We look forward to your response, and to a conversation about how best to achieve these goals.
Regards,
Freddie Bacong and Darlene Senko | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Kat Bell | Bright Horizons 345 Adams St.
Michael Casca and Geraldine de Puy | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Lizette and Joseph Christoff | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Jason and Valerie Clark | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Angie Conneran and Vahid Amirghassemi | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Courtney Hart | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Scott and Gwyneth Hartman | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Arianna and Edward Fernandez | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Arija Flowers | Bright Horizons 345 Adams St.
Dave Gonzales | Bright Horizons 345 Adams St.
Rebecca Havekost and John Benson | Bright Horizons 345 Adams St.
Hayley Horowitz | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Kyle McKay | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Dan and Vivian Michael | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Gina Pastore and Aristeo Kardi | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Maria and Kevin Ramos | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Noah Solow and Alex Rizio | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Daphna Thier and Chris Dols | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Brett Wise and Julie Diorio | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
We are a contingent of parents with children enrolled at Bright Horizons in New York City. We write to express our grave concern about Bright Horizons’ failure to support its staff in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. Earlier this year, Bright Horizons required all New York staff to work at centers for two weeks after the governor had declared a state of emergency, and it announced its plan to eliminate their pay well before the federal government guaranteed adequate unemployment benefits. Staff remain uninformed about Bright Horizons’ plans for reopening and uncertain about the future of their pay, their benefits, and their job security.
Given Bright Horizons’ recent and ongoing failures, we seek concrete assurances that Bright Horizons will protect our children’s caretakers from medical and economic threats as long as the pandemic and its fallout continue. Bright Horizons CEO Stephen Kramer recently released a statement calling for all “individuals who care” to “join the fight to ensure all people share the same opportunities, privilege, respect and freedoms.” But this call for solidarity is at odds with Bright Horizons’ treatment of its staff, particularly in response to the COVID-19 crisis. Bright Horizons’ recent public statements in support of protestors ring hollow absent meaningful action to protect its employees, who, in New York City whereour children are enrolled, are disproportionately Black and other people of color.
Our fear for the consequences of Bright Horizons’ actions is twofold: we are troubled by the implications for the long-term health and stability of our centers, and we are distressed about the safety and livelihood of the teachers and administrative staff whom we care for deeply.
When we learned that Bright Horizons made the decision to stop paying its employees their regular income in the first week of April, we were shocked to realize that the two safety nets available to them would be individual classroom collections and public assistance. At the time, public assistance would have been dramatically inadequate to meet their basic, daily needs; even after Congress passed the CARES Act, the Labor Department has been unable to disburse funds in a timely manner to the record millions of people filing for unemployment benefits due to the crisis brought about by COVID-19, putting our administrators and staff in a precarious financial position. And Bright Horizons has not facilitated its staff’s access to the benefits that are available. For example, it has not ensured that employees staffing centers for essential workers know about the unemployment benefits to which they are entitled, allowing teachers to work in life-threatening conditions while receiving less pay than they would if they remained unemployed. With Bright Horizons touting “thirty-plus years showing the world how to champion for working families,” it is unfathomable that Bright Horizons should abandon its staff in a moment of crisis and, at best, expect the parent community to shoulder the responsibility of filling in the gaps that Bright Horizons created.
Bright Horizons has built a strong reputation on how well it cares for its employees. We share in the company’s stated concerns for employees, which is why the parent community at just one center raised tens of thousands of dollars to tide teachers over when neither the company nor the government was paying them. Bright Horizons boasts over 175 Fortune 500 companies among its 1,150+ clients, some of which have stepped in to compensate employees while Bright Horizons, as a corporate entity, has not.
As a publicly traded company with $2.062B in revenue last year, Bright Horizons generates substantial earnings for its shareholders and has maintained a healthy profit margin from 2018-2019. From 2018 to 2019, the company’s net income increased 14% to $18MM. In the past two years, the company has bought back over $150MM of shares from stockholders, including its own executives, and listed $228MM+ in total current assets as of December 31, 2019, illustrating that Bright Horizons has a hefty pool of cash on hand that it will use in the interest of strengthening existing shareholder value. These publicly available documents that attest to Bright Horizons’ healthy financial position indicate that the company has significant cash reserves to sustain unforeseen hits to revenue, such as the current COVID-19 pandemic.
We are aware that Bright Horizons executives and board members are forgoing some of their compensation, as reported by The Boston Globe. More importantly, we recognize and appreciate that Bright Horizons has adopted several meaningful measures to protect its employees. For example, Bright Horizons has until now continued to provide employees with access to their ordinary health coverage, and teachers received two weeks of pay after the centers closed. These measures have been essential to staff members’ welfare.
But these measures follow Bright Horizons’ decisions to require teachers to continue working well into March when it had become unsafe, and to cease paying its center administrators and teachers when they had no reliable prospect of alternative, adequate sources of income. Bright Horizons provided no, or dramatically inadequate, information and assistance to teachers regarding access to unemployment benefits; as a result, many--including those staffing Bright Horizons’ centers for essential workers’ children--have foregone thousands of dollars in badly needed income. Many teachers cannot afford the health care plans that have been offered to them, and even those who can have no guarantee that their access to coverage will continue. Staff has been provided with very little information about the company’s plans for reopening centers, continuing their employment, ensuring their health and safety upon reopening, or assisting them financially if and when the CARES Act expires. More broadly, these are conditions created by a company that, in the best economic circumstances, fails by many measures to pay a living wage to the center staff and administrators who are the very backbone, and the heart, of the Bright Horizons community. The average Bright Horizons employee earns an annual income of $23,969. Even in New York City, where staff wages are higher, associate teachers make less than $35,000 per year, deemed a poverty salary for those trying to raise a family. Meanwhile, total compensation for executive officers and board members exceeded $10MM in the 2018 fiscal year. Collectively, yearly compensation for Bright Horizons’ executives could pay the annual salaries of 422 Bright Horizons staff members.
Against this backdrop, we believe that recent partial executive pay cuts are not meaningful indications of a company as dedicated to protecting employees as maximizing shareholders’ profit. Further, we hope the benefits protection offered by Bright Horizons will remain in place as its valuable employees face the crisis of how to pay their bills and rent, feed their families, and stay afloat.
The benefits of the CARES Act expire in July. If they are not renewed, and/or Bright Horizons ceases to provide benefits while employment continues to be affected by COVID-19, teachers left without sufficient resources to support themselves and their families will suffer. They will also be forced to explore other employment options. As a result, Bright Horizons will experience significant attrition, leaving our children with unfamiliar faces when they finally return to their classrooms. Consistency and stability for our children are more important than ever before in these wildly destabilizing times, and we do not want to see our cherished Bright Horizons leaders and teachers depart because they have been left with no other choice. Consistency and stability is even more important for staff, many of whom have dedicated their careers to educating our children and supporting our families.
As the nation’s second largest provider of employer-sponsored child care and as a FORTUNE “100 Best Places to Work,” Bright Horizons is in a uniquely powerful position to lead by example, setting the standard as a corporate citizen to show other organizations how to support employees during an unprecedented global emergency, and to show its customers that it cares about their families and the families of the teachers and staff who have helped to raise their children.
We therefore call on Bright Horizons to commit to the following:
- Provide full benefits to all center staff without interruption until full employment resumes;
- Guarantee continued employment and an eventual return to work for all center staff who were employed as of the last day of center operation;
- Guarantee payments to all center staff to ensure that their income remains equal to their ordinary wages when the CARES Act weekly benefits expire, if they are not renewed and full employment has not yet resumed;
- In the event that centers reopen before the state of emergency is resolved, develop a plan to ensure that no staff member suffers professional or economic hardship for choosing not to return to work for fear of contracting COVID-19;
- Provide hazard pay for employees who continue to provide service for children of essential workers; and
- Proactively provide information to all employees about their eligibility for unemployment benefits, and assistance in accessing those benefits.
In addition, once Bright Horizons has provided for staff to survive the present emergency, we look forward to a broader discussion about Bright Horizons’ specific plans to “join the fight to ensure all people share the same opportunities, privilege, respect and freedoms” by offering its staff appropriate and dignified wages commensurate with their skill, dedication, and importance in the lives of Bright Horizons’ students.
We expect Bright Horizons to relay a strong statement to our parent community: that Bright Horizons stands behind its administrators and teachers, honoring their critical importance in shaping the minds and hearts of our children. We look forward to your response, and to a conversation about how best to achieve these goals.
Regards,
Freddie Bacong and Darlene Senko | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Kat Bell | Bright Horizons 345 Adams St.
Michael Casca and Geraldine de Puy | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Lizette and Joseph Christoff | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Jason and Valerie Clark | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Angie Conneran and Vahid Amirghassemi | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Courtney Hart | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Scott and Gwyneth Hartman | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Arianna and Edward Fernandez | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Arija Flowers | Bright Horizons 345 Adams St.
Dave Gonzales | Bright Horizons 345 Adams St.
Rebecca Havekost and John Benson | Bright Horizons 345 Adams St.
Hayley Horowitz | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Kyle McKay | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Dan and Vivian Michael | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Gina Pastore and Aristeo Kardi | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Maria and Kevin Ramos | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Noah Solow and Alex Rizio | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Daphna Thier and Chris Dols | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Brett Wise and Julie Diorio | FedKids at 26 Federal Plaza
Parent Testimonials
FedKids took Kari in when my childcare provider could no longer provide care and it was the best thing that happened to our family. FedKids is so much more than childcare or early education, it is a sense of community and family. The teachers and staff deeply care about the personal and educational development and growth of each child, you can see it in all they do. Kariana has thrived and I couldn’t be happier with the care and education she receives. More importantly Kariana is happy and loves each moment she spends with her teachers and friends. -Gina Pastore and Aristeo Kardi, Kariana (age 3)
Our son Wiley has blossomed in his Bright Horizons FedKids classroom; he loves his teachers and classmates and has been learning so much from them. We want to make sure his teachers are supported during this time, and the transition back is as seamless as possible. -Lizette and Joseph Christoff, Wiley (age 2)
Both of our children attended FedKids, and our daughter has been there since she was three months old. The staff and administration have never been anything but warm and loving towards our kids, respectful and attentive to our needs as parents, and I always feel really good about dropping my children there every day, knowing they will be cared for by a kind and professional group of people. -Michael Casca and Geraldine de Puy, Cosima (age 2)
The Bright Horizons Community, particularly the teachers and staff, have been instrumental in Joseph's growth since attending at 6 months old. Their dedication, professionalism, and loving touch give our family peace of mind. -Brett Wise and Julie Diorio, Joseph Wise (age 2)
I have observed firsthand the exceptional nurturing Illyena's teachers have provided to the children. The teachers are truly professionals dedicated to educate and have fun with our children. -Freddie Bacong and Darlene Senko, Illyena (age 1.5)
The staff at Fedkids is loving and dedicated. They deserve only good things. -Maria & Kevin Ramos, Landon Ramos (age 3)
Over the past year, our family has faced many challenges including an international move from Mexico City, Mexico to New York City, NY as well as some deeply personal life events that rattled our entire family. Throughout all of these changes, one constant in our life that brought a sense of peace and calm was the knowledge that once we dropped off our daughter at FedKids - specifically with her teachers Shonette, Anai, and Victoria in the Bumblebees classroom - that she would be so incredibly loved, taken care of, and properly educated. Elif's teachers have been a blessing and we have personally seen our daughter flourish over the past few months - a direct result of the love and attention her teachers and administrators pay to our daughter and her classmates. Ms. Shonette, Ms. Anai, and Ms. Victoria, along with the FedKids Administrative Staff have been and continue to be an indispensable part of our daughter's education and personal growth. They have repeatedly gone above and beyond their basic duties and have shown both a passion and vigor to their professional excellence and love of the children that deserves better treatment than to have Bright Horizons decide not to pay them during this crucial and unprecedented time in the world. We demand that all FedKids teachers and administrators be paid their due salaries through the duration of this closure (due to the COVID-19 pandemic crisis). It was the right decision to close the FedKids center in March 2020 to protect community health...do not create a financial burden to punish them for a community health decision that protects everyone. -Angie Conneran and Vahid Amirghassemi, Elif C. Amirghassemi (age 2.5)
Edie's teachers are some of the most skilled, caring, kind teachers we've ever met. Edie runs into the arms of her teachers every day, and sometimes does not want to leave when we come pick her up! These teachers are the reason we love our Bright Horizons center so much. They day is full of enriching activities, but also relaxed enough for all the children to really get seen by their teachers. We're always at ease when Edie is in their care, and we know from previous experience that that isn't something to take for granted. In a previous daycare there was little to no consistency in who was taking care of the children. Anyone of age it seemed like was deemed a teacher, and every day it was a surprise who might be in the room. So we know it matters who is in the room. We love these teachers so much, and we want them to weather this storm as best as possible. We hope Bright Horizons will not add questions of income and healthcare benefits to the hardship of the moment. -Chris Dols and Daphna Thier, Edie (age 1.5)
Joseph has attended Bright Horizons since he was 6 months old. The caring nature and professional of the staff give our family peace of mind, knowing that Joseph is in good hands. We can thank the teachers and staff enough. -Brett Wise and Julie Diorio, Joseph (age 2)
We love sending our son to FedKids the teachers and staff treat us like family and make going to work and leaving my son all day an easy decision. They love him and care for him like their own and feel like they are part of our family as well. We started at FedKids when our son was 3 months and he has always enjoyed coming every morning and never wants to leave. The teachers and staff have been our support system, the people we go to with our parenting question and who share our joy when our son learns something new. We miss them all, hope they are all well and can't wait until we can see them again they mean the world to us. -Arianna and Edward Fernandez, Cassian (age 1.5)
We can hardly function without them. They are wonderful educators, and our children flourish in their care. -Scott and Gwyneth Hartman, Eleanor (age 4) and Margaret (8 months)
The staff at FedKids are warm, professional and constantly reassuring. I know that when I drop my daughter off every day, she is safe and cared for, and comes home delighted and happy. I couldn’t ask for more from a daycare center. -Mike Casca and Geraldine de Puy, Cosima (age 2)
Our son Wiley has blossomed in his Bright Horizons FedKids classroom; he loves his teachers and classmates and has been learning so much from them. We want to make sure his teachers are supported during this time, and the transition back is as seamless as possible. -Lizette and Joseph Christoff, Wiley (age 2)
Both of our children attended FedKids, and our daughter has been there since she was three months old. The staff and administration have never been anything but warm and loving towards our kids, respectful and attentive to our needs as parents, and I always feel really good about dropping my children there every day, knowing they will be cared for by a kind and professional group of people. -Michael Casca and Geraldine de Puy, Cosima (age 2)
The Bright Horizons Community, particularly the teachers and staff, have been instrumental in Joseph's growth since attending at 6 months old. Their dedication, professionalism, and loving touch give our family peace of mind. -Brett Wise and Julie Diorio, Joseph Wise (age 2)
I have observed firsthand the exceptional nurturing Illyena's teachers have provided to the children. The teachers are truly professionals dedicated to educate and have fun with our children. -Freddie Bacong and Darlene Senko, Illyena (age 1.5)
The staff at Fedkids is loving and dedicated. They deserve only good things. -Maria & Kevin Ramos, Landon Ramos (age 3)
Over the past year, our family has faced many challenges including an international move from Mexico City, Mexico to New York City, NY as well as some deeply personal life events that rattled our entire family. Throughout all of these changes, one constant in our life that brought a sense of peace and calm was the knowledge that once we dropped off our daughter at FedKids - specifically with her teachers Shonette, Anai, and Victoria in the Bumblebees classroom - that she would be so incredibly loved, taken care of, and properly educated. Elif's teachers have been a blessing and we have personally seen our daughter flourish over the past few months - a direct result of the love and attention her teachers and administrators pay to our daughter and her classmates. Ms. Shonette, Ms. Anai, and Ms. Victoria, along with the FedKids Administrative Staff have been and continue to be an indispensable part of our daughter's education and personal growth. They have repeatedly gone above and beyond their basic duties and have shown both a passion and vigor to their professional excellence and love of the children that deserves better treatment than to have Bright Horizons decide not to pay them during this crucial and unprecedented time in the world. We demand that all FedKids teachers and administrators be paid their due salaries through the duration of this closure (due to the COVID-19 pandemic crisis). It was the right decision to close the FedKids center in March 2020 to protect community health...do not create a financial burden to punish them for a community health decision that protects everyone. -Angie Conneran and Vahid Amirghassemi, Elif C. Amirghassemi (age 2.5)
Edie's teachers are some of the most skilled, caring, kind teachers we've ever met. Edie runs into the arms of her teachers every day, and sometimes does not want to leave when we come pick her up! These teachers are the reason we love our Bright Horizons center so much. They day is full of enriching activities, but also relaxed enough for all the children to really get seen by their teachers. We're always at ease when Edie is in their care, and we know from previous experience that that isn't something to take for granted. In a previous daycare there was little to no consistency in who was taking care of the children. Anyone of age it seemed like was deemed a teacher, and every day it was a surprise who might be in the room. So we know it matters who is in the room. We love these teachers so much, and we want them to weather this storm as best as possible. We hope Bright Horizons will not add questions of income and healthcare benefits to the hardship of the moment. -Chris Dols and Daphna Thier, Edie (age 1.5)
Joseph has attended Bright Horizons since he was 6 months old. The caring nature and professional of the staff give our family peace of mind, knowing that Joseph is in good hands. We can thank the teachers and staff enough. -Brett Wise and Julie Diorio, Joseph (age 2)
We love sending our son to FedKids the teachers and staff treat us like family and make going to work and leaving my son all day an easy decision. They love him and care for him like their own and feel like they are part of our family as well. We started at FedKids when our son was 3 months and he has always enjoyed coming every morning and never wants to leave. The teachers and staff have been our support system, the people we go to with our parenting question and who share our joy when our son learns something new. We miss them all, hope they are all well and can't wait until we can see them again they mean the world to us. -Arianna and Edward Fernandez, Cassian (age 1.5)
We can hardly function without them. They are wonderful educators, and our children flourish in their care. -Scott and Gwyneth Hartman, Eleanor (age 4) and Margaret (8 months)
The staff at FedKids are warm, professional and constantly reassuring. I know that when I drop my daughter off every day, she is safe and cared for, and comes home delighted and happy. I couldn’t ask for more from a daycare center. -Mike Casca and Geraldine de Puy, Cosima (age 2)
