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I'm a male daycare worker. I primarily work with school aged children that I pick up after school and bring back to the daycare center. However, one of our employees quit without notice who works in the youngest 2 year old room, and I've been covering half her shift.
One of the parents found out a man was taking care of his daughter and called to complain that it's inappropriate, and that men shouldn't be changing diapers there, especially when it's 2 year old girls. She told him we can't discriminate, and that I'm there to help out and I've been very much needed while they are looking for a replacement for the other teacher. He went on about how he isn't comfortable with it, and here is where I told her I thought she should have just asked him to remove his daughter from our school and send her elsewhere then. What she told him is that we can try having the other teacher in there who is a woman taking care of her diaper changing and activities involving touching from now on.
I don't think my boss is in anyway trying to agree with him, because she hired me partly because she thinks it's valuable to have men working there, and the kids are more well rounded being taken care of by both genders and not just women. What bothers me though is somehow she thinks I'm going to agree to comply with not doing my regular duties because I'm a man. She was mostly just venting about him when she told me, and not saying I had to do anything different, and then after she hung up with him she was starting to feel a bit uneasy about having told him that, and she is gonna call our regional director to ask if it is okay to tell a parent that as if it's not she is going to have to rescind it to him.
Now, as a man, I'm much more comfortable doing diapers when it is for boys as before I worked there, the only experience I have had with diaper changing was with my brothers, and I feel overall I feel a bit less intimidated, but I don't get to choose which kids use their diaper at the times I'm responsible for the changing, and it's my job so I do what needs to be done. The other issue is, sometimes me and the other male worker are both in there, and other times after nap time she is one of the ones that doesn't go to sleep all the time, and there is only one worker in there, and after lunch they often use their diapers again having just been changed. So, I'm not going to call the office and ask for a woman to come in just because her dad is a sexist.
What I want to do is approach the dad when he comes and tell him that was very uncalled for to request such a discriminatory policy, and if he has a problem with me working in daycare, let's take it outside away from the kids and discuss it, but I don't know how exactly to word it.
Also, I want to find a nice way to tell my boss that asking me to comply with their instruction to hand her off to another worker to have her changed is discrimination as well, and if I were to call corporate or our legal team, she'd be in trouble as well. However, I think she is not intentionally discriminating, just trying to get the parent off her back because she has more important things to do that have to have him complaining to everyone at the top of the company and her having to deal with having to dis-enroll a child which is always a difficult and emotional process.
I just don't understand why the scrutiny is always there. I'm not even doing anything wrong and having complaints. A couple weeks ago, I had a friend online who was a so called equal rights liberal and feminist, and she decided not to be my friend anymore, because any guy who enjoys working with 2 year old kids and babies as his job is just creepy.
I told my roommate about it and he wants me to reveal where the guy lives so he could go slash his tires, which I think is a bit extreme, but I definitely feel the same frustration.
There was a male provider at my daycare. He was awesome, but often had parents request he not change diapers. He ended up quitting. I was sad to see that happen to someone.
Don't confront the parent. Nothing good will come of it. Elevate up your corporate ladder.
I just don't understand why the scrutiny is always there. I'm not even doing anything wrong and having complaints. A couple weeks ago, I had a friend online who was a so called equal rights liberal and feminist, and she decided not to be my friend anymore, because any guy who enjoys working with 2 year old kids and babies as his job is just creepy.
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That's outrageous! I'm sorry that happened to you, OP. Chalk it up to "you never know about online friends". I wonder if people like that would think it was creepy for a dad to change the diaper of his own baby girl?
Good for you for doing the work you do, and for pitching in to help in a short-staffed age group! And yes, your boss clearly was just trying to get the parent off her back. But she definitely should follow through with calling higher-ups for feedback about how to handle such situations.
One begins to suspect that a parent worried about a thing like that might have questionable inclinations in that regard, himself.
In my awareness, there are many more cases of mothers molesting toddlers (their own boys, and in some cases--girls) than there are cases of men doing so. Probably because women by far have more access than men to toddlers, as a 24-hour thing. Sick people come in both genders.
Keep up the good work! Feel free to nudge your boss toward finding out what the corporate policy is on the issue. It's important to know, as it could come up at any time. And good for her for supporting male daycare staff. She sounds like a great person to work for. Use this issue as a way to develop the professional relationship with her, and to let her know you appreciate her overall stance.
The way he justified it is that if he didn't think a woman doctor should be looking at his private area, and if there was there should be others in the room to make him more comfortable. He also said something about if a man is responsible for changing a girl's diaper, there should be other women in the room watching him do it. Our director said we don't have that policy for women diapering, so we can't have it for men either. Also, he didn't consider that our ratio is 8:1, so if there are more than 8 children, there is another staff member in the room while I'm doing it, and we also have windows in every classroom so you can see the changing going on in other classrooms, and he's seen the building, so there is really no valid reason he should be worried.
The director said she felt a bit uneasy about trying to tell him they'd have the female change her diaper, and she is going to report the call to the regional director to see what they say about that and if they need to say anything else to the father. I'm guessing they will, because sometimes it is me and the other guy working that room when someone is out. Other times out on the playground, we take a number of children inside to stay in ratio if one or more of them needs a diaper change, or during naps we have leeway with ratios if they kids are laying down, and I'm not just going to call in a female worker if she needs to be changed just because her dad doesn't like men. The director should just be asking him to leave.
What's ironic here is that if parents actually saw me working, they'd be more comfortable with me changing diapers on their child than most of the women working there.
I remember several times a child I've changed still had feces on them that wasn't cleaned the last time they were changed by someone else, and I don't try to rush and go fast while not doing it right and risk them getting diaper rash. Other employees have also moaned before when I was changing kids who were wet because they don't do diapers for another 30 minutes according to the schedule. Parents have also complained that we go through too many diapers they buy because several times the kids are changed when they are dry because of the schedule, and they use their diaper 15 minutes later and I don't leave kids sitting in dirty diapers.
Seems to me that, at the corporate level, a modified 'contract' should be drawn up .. I am assuming that these days there are formal signed agreements between parents and the 'daycare' facility that stipulate the responsibilities of each party - ie. parents must pick up kids by x o'clock, must pay $x for each day or week, etc. per child, facility will agree to take all care to do x, y, z, etc.
Perhaps that contract needs to be amended to state that the parent agrees that staff can be either male or female and that any staff member, regardless of gender, may be required to fulfill any needed duties with any child, male or female, (including but not limited to, accompanying a child to and helping in the bathroom, diapering a child, etc.) at any time as is warranted - and parents will need to sign that amendment. And it may also be necessary to add a list of functions that a single staff member will or will not perform (at least occasionally) 'unsupervised' if the need should arise.
That should prevent this type of issue in future - or at least keep it down to a dull roar and the facility will have a way to ask parents to withdraw their child if they make a stink about such matters again.
As for today .. well, I hope corporate contacts that parent and just sets the record straight with him as to what he can expect from here on out - and tells him there will be an amended contract coming soon as a result of this unanticipated incident. Said parent then will be warned and can either decide to find another caregiver or to adjust to realities.
Seems to me that, at the corporate level, a modified 'contract' should be drawn up .. I am assuming that these days there are formal signed agreements between parents and the 'daycare' facility that stipulate the responsibilities of each party - ie. parents must pick up kids by x o'clock, must pay $x for each day or week, etc. per child, facility will agree to take all care to do x, y, z, etc.
Perhaps that contract needs to be amended to state that the parent agrees that staff can be either male or female and that any staff member, regardless of gender, may be required to fulfill any needed duties with any child, male or female, (including but not limited to, accompanying a child to and helping in the bathroom, diapering a child, etc.) at any time as is warranted - and parents will need to sign that amendment. And it may also be necessary to add a list of functions that a single staff member will or will not perform (at least occasionally) 'unsupervised' if the need should arise.
That should prevent this type of issue in future - or at least keep it down to a dull roar and the facility will have a way to ask parents to withdraw their child if they make a stink about such matters again.
As for today .. well, I hope corporate contacts that parent and just sets the record straight with him as to what he can expect from here on out - and tells him there will be an amended contract coming soon as a result of this unanticipated incident. Said parent then will be warned and can either decide to find another caregiver or to adjust to realities.
This is a good idea. When parents come to sign up their child for daycare, they'd see in the contract that the facility may have male staff. If they object, they can look for another daycare.
I can just picture desperate parents scouring their town for daycare centers that don't hire men; can you imagine panicky parents calling around asking, "Hello, I need a daycare facility for my child; do you hire men? I'm looking for one that doesn't have male staff."
Discrimination against men is real and on the increase. Female privilege is also very real.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ruth4Truth
So is male privilege. Society still has a ways to go in resolving its issues.
So it would appear that when a male changing diapers is clearly identified as an obedient spouse, he becomes a role model in feminist eyes, but if he des so for a living, he is immediately suspected as a potential pervert.
Double standard much?
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