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On June 5, 2024 the Office of Childhood (OOC) received a report alleging "There is a student in the Pre-Kindergarten class who is very violent to the other children and teachers. He leaves marks on them. For months now he has thrown chairs and toys at people, has hit and has left defined marks. He has several reports a day of his incidents. He lashes out on others without warning." After conducting an investigation, Compliance Inspector (CI) Caylin Mertz has found this allegation to be substantiated based on the following evidence and rule violation:
5 CSR 25-500.182(1)(C)11 which states "Children shall not be permitted to intimidate or harm others, harm themselves, or destroy property."
On June 11, 2024 CI Caylin Mertz conducted an unannounced inspection and walkthrough at the facility. CI Mertz observed 41 incident reports from April 2, 2024 to June 6, 2024 regarding Child A being physically aggressive towards other children, caregivers or classroom materials. CI Mertz interviewed Assistant Director Kaitlyn Hanks, Caregiver Deborah Copeland, Caregiver Shelbee Collins, Child A (4 years old), Child B (4 years old), Child C (5 years old), Child D (4 years old) and Child E (4 years old). Assistant Director Kaitlyn indicated Child A is having behavioral challenges and averages about two incidents per day. He has been attending since April. She had a meeting with Child A's parents to discuss his behavior. She provided CI Mertz a copy of the plan which indicates they will have Child A do a wall press when he is struggling. It was explained that a wall press is referring to pictures of hands printed off by Kaitlyn and hung on the wall, when Child A is angry he is supposed to hit the hands on the wall rather than friends. Caregiver Deborah indicated Child A's aggression is more frequent than other children his age and she feels the facility is permitting him to harm other children. Caregiver Shelbee indicated Child A is very violent and she does not believe that much is being done to prevent him from harming other children. Child A did not provide any information to support a rule violation. Child B, Child C, Child D, and Child E all indicated they were afraid of Child A and described various incidences where they were hurt by him.
On July 31, 2024, CI Mertz interviewed Parent A, who indicated she was called nearly every day regarding Child A's behavior. She stated they did have a meeting but she did not feel like a plan was really developed for him.
On August 6, 2024, Caregiver Delaney Posey was interviewed. She began in Child A's class in late April/early May. She observed him to hit, bite, scratch, kick, throw toys and chairs, and yell. She stated he drew blood and left marks on children. She stated incidents were occurring every day and she did not have training to manage Child A's behaviors. She believes the behavior was allowed to go on too long.
On August 6, 2024, Director Melissa Freres was interviewed. She indicated they contacted their behavioral support team within La Petite regarding Child A's behaviors but did not contact an inclusion specialist. Incidents were occurring several times a week. They were not given any special training to manage these behaviors aside from the routine training provided by La Petite. She indicated Kaitlyn is the person responsible for managing behavior issues at the facility.
CI Mertz attempted to interview Caregiver Kristi Berg but was unsuccessful.
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