No contact among buddies

Max is a bit frustrated. “Now I’m still not allowed to play with Leo,” he wails, rolling his eyes. Max is a preschooler. And emergency child. He doesn’t have younger siblings. That’s why he’s separated from his buddy Leo, at least in kindergarten. He is also about to go to school, but has his younger brother in tow and therefore plays in a different small group than Max. Yes, it’s complicated. But not only for the children, but above all for the nursery school teachers who have long since not only got the frustration of their little protégés.

Bernhard Hornig knows that too. The specialist for child daycare facilities at the district office in Kitzingen answered up to 1200 telephone inquiries from daycare centers during the first weeks of the ban on entry due to the corona pandemic. In the meantime, a certain routine has also developed among the executives in dealing with the statements made by the Bavarian state government. Because, with all the freedom of design in the individual facilities, they are always significant. “Everyone is rotating, the guidelines, adapted to their own requirements, to be adhered to and designed as best as possible.” His authority has repeatedly become a grief box from the highest, local supervisory authority. Hornig had to cheer up and encourage, sometimes admonish. “Many lines were very afraid of doing something wrong,” says Hornig. “And still everyone did their best.”

The BRK children’s home in the Marshall Heights did not have much time to think about it. The facility had been taking care of many children of systemically important parents since mid-March and also offered extended opening hours. In the meantime, the children’s home is again two-thirds full and is thus well above the district average of a good 35 percent. Felix Wallstrm, managing director of the Kitzingen district association in the Bavarian Red Cross, and his team are looking forward to the adjusted normal operation – even if there will initially be no talk of this, at least conceptually. Because the open system, as practiced in the BRK children’s home, provides permeable groups and children who can move freely around the house – unthinkable in times of chains of infection and ban on meetings.

Either way, the daycare staff have not been bored in the past few weeks, even if it may seem like this at first glance. “Where there are no children, there is no work” is a fallacy, which apparently many parents are up to. “In the beginning, days off were taken down or vacations taken in many facilities,” says Bernhard Hornig. “But there was also enough to do.” Even in the facilities that were not very busy. Concepts were revised, hygiene measures taken, concepts for the different return scenarios developed. In addition, the daycare centers tried to keep in touch with their children – without having any contact: with play offers by email, handicrafts for special festivities or hands-on activities that ensured that the kindergarten was not completely forgotten.

Short-time work was therefore not an issue in very few institutions. In the district of Kitzingen, short-time working was only applied for in very few individual cases, according to Wolfgang Albert, spokesman for the agency for work in Wrzburg, there are no exact figures. In total, applications for short-time work were submitted for 626 people in the districts of Wrzburg, Main-Spessart and Kitzingen in the area of ​​“education and teaching”. “A very small number,” explains Albert. For good reason. “Due to the closure of the daycare centers and the resulting loss of work, the employees did not have to fear any loss of earnings at first.” The federal, state and local authorities continued to support the carriers. And after a short phase of irritation at the beginning of the lockdown, work too.

And yet – or because of this – there are considerations in many facilities to shorten the summer closing times in the room. On the one hand, many parents used up their vacation because they had to and still have to look after their children. On the other hand, the daycare staff have a right to their vacation. And for the most part, it is urgently needed. “We will not ban summer closing days,” says Bernhard Hornig. “But we recommend asking about the need and enabling what is possible in some way.” He cannot give a panacea on this issue.

Because in this context too, the situation is different in each individual facility. One day care center has been looking after a large number of children for weeks because it is located in an agricultural village with high childcare needs. Elsewhere, there is a large company with many employees, but due to optimized home office conditions, they were able to look after most of their children at home. The requirements are different. And so the measures taken on the way to “reduced regular operation” will look very different.

Bernhard Hornig is expecting this from July 1st. Until then, the preschoolers of the 2020/21 kindergarten year will be back at the facilities with their siblings, after which the doors will be open again for all kindergarten and crèche children. It is not only the person responsible for daycare at the district office who is curious to see how the facilities solve these constantly new challenges, especially since he is certain that the pandemic will leave traces in the area of ​​toddler care for years to come.

Will Max and Leo still experience the day when they can dig, dig and bolt again in kindergarten before they start school in September? The answer is not clear, but it could be frustrating.