Free Republic

Mothers screamed abuse at nursery paedophile Vanessa George yesterday as she began a prison sentence that could see her freed after only seven years. One called the punishment 'a joke' and stormed out of court in disgust. Another lunged towards the dock and threatened to kill her. The dramatic scenes came as George, 39, was given an indeterminate sentence for 'plumbing new depths of depravity' by abusing children in her care. ..... The scant detail she gave police may never enable them to identify which children she assaulted while looking after babies and toddlers at Little Ted's nursery in Plymouth....

Experts are warning child care centres to drastically limit the amount of time children spend watching television or ban TV altogether. Research by the Royal Melbourne Children's Hospital suggests children under the age of two should not watch any TV at all. The researchers have now written guidelines for the Federal Government as part of the Get Up and Grow guidelines to reduce childhood obesity. They are designed specifically for child care centres but also provide some advice for parents. Statistics show that four-month-old infants watch on average 44 minutes of TV each day and children under the age of...

MIDDLEVILLE (WZZM)- A West Michigan woman says the state is threatening her with fines and possibly jail time for babysitting her neighbors' children. Lisa Snyder of Middleville says her neighborhood school bus stop is right in front of her home. It arrives after her neighbors need to be at work, so she watches three of their children for 15-40 minutes until the bus comes. The Department of Human Services received a complaint that Snyder was operating an illegal child care home. DHS contacted Snyder and told her to get licensed, stop watching her neighbors' kids, or face the consequences. "That...

Supervisors suggest putting unemployed parents to work caring for their own children as part of proposed changes to CalWorks and other state government aid programs. With steep state budget cuts under debate in Sacramento, Los Angeles County supervisors voted Tuesday to push for changes to CalWorks and other government aid programs they said would save nearly $270 million. Included in their suggestions is a novel proposal: Put unemployed parents to work caring for their own children. "What we're saying is do not cut Welfare to Work outright: Target the cuts to the people who are the most expensive," said Miguel...

First lady Michelle Obama says everyone should have what she has: a chief of staff and a personal assistant. Speaking Thursday in support of sick days with pay and flexible work schedules, Mrs. Obama said that, as challenging as her new life may sometimes seem, hers is a "very blessed situation, because I have what most families don't have" -- support from her mother and a staff. "Everyone should have a chief of staff and a set of personal assistants," she said at a meeting of Corporate Voices for Working Families, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that works to develop and...

Children looked after by grandparents 'are naughtier than those who spend day in nursery' Research says children looked after by their grandparents are less likely to be ready for school Young children looked after by grandparents are more likely to be badly behaved than those sent to nursery, a study claims today. They tended to have wider vocabularies, but were also more likely to show 'problem behaviour' and find it harder to get on with other children, said researchers. They were also less likely to be ready for school, according to the study by the Institute of Education, a University...

Mayor Nutter said yesterday that five of the 11 library branches once scheduled to close permanently on Thursday are instead on track to be taken over by private foundations, wealthy individuals, companies, and community development corporations. ( ... ) "Libraries are much more than repositories for books. We know this," said Nutter, who ordered 11 of 54 branches closed as part of a larger plan to address a $1 billion five-year budget gap. "They are the absolute complete nexus of community life." Nutter made his remarks at a City Hall news conference where he was loudly heckled by dozens of...

"When it comes to caring for children, Sweden ranks highest among the world’s wealthy countries, according to a new report from the United Nations children’s organization, Unicef."

FOB DELTA — Obstetricians and midwives at the al Zahara Hospital in al Kut received maternal and child care training from hospital staff and Coalition forces, Nov. 26. Eighty-seven students attended the lecture, which covered topics on maternal health, child care and treatment for choking, taught by Dr. Halam Turki, an Iraqi-American obstetrics and gynecological surgeon. The Wasit director general for health; Company C, 589th Brigade Support Battalion, 41st Fires Brigade; and the 304th Civil Affairs Bde., of Philadelphia; sponsored the training. The training is part of the ongoing Operation Gunner Med, to improve the state of health care in...

ROCKFORD, Ill. – The nation's economic troubles play out one family at a time at the New Horizons Learning Center in this struggling city two hours northwest of Chicago. Some parents have been laid off and must pull their children out of the day care center until they can find a job. Others' employment hours have been cut, so they reduce their kids' attendance to a few days a week. Financial strains prompt one mother to pay with a postdated check. Another chooses to work in the middle of the night — after putting her kids to bed — because...

I was perusing the Kids and Parenting section of MSNBC and found an article entitled: Drinking water can hurt babies under 6 months. According to Johns Hopkins Children's Center in Baltimore, MD. "Babies younger than six months old should never be given water to drink [because] consuming too much water can put babies at risk of a potentially life-threatening condition known as water intoxication."

LEAD: Ten years after the U.S. started talking about ''family values,'' many wonder why we are still unable to provide decent education, health care and opportunity for all of our children.... ... At this pivotal moment, much can be learned by comparing America's child care system to France's.... ...What we saw was a coordinated, comprehensive system, supported across the political spectrum, that links day care, early education and health care - and is accessible to virtually every child... We found sharp contrasts between the French and U.S. child care systems....In France, mandated paid parental leave for child birth and adoption...

I hope I didn't screw up my first attempt at a Vanity Post. My daughter attends a private school. She is 19 months old and has been there close to a year now. She is a bit more advanced than kids her age, yet she has remained within her age group. She was to be moved up to a new class last month. She doest use sippy cup, and she is also letting her teachers know she has to use the bathroom, but they cannot take the time away to sit her down because two teachers have to be in...

A text message from a virtual stranger saying 'I want to have sex with you tonight' might, on occasion, be considered a compliment. When it comes from the nanny you just hired to look after your eight-month-old baby, it's bad news. Being a nervous first-time mother, I had done my homework to find Carole. I had interviewed her twice at length and spoken to her previous employer. As much as it upset me to leave my baby to go back to work, we needed the money - but at least I thought I had done everything to make sure Lily...

A new study finds that children who received better quality child care before kindergarten had better vocabulary scores later on than those who received lower quality child care. The study also finds that children who remained in child care longer were more likely to have behavior problems in the sixth grade. Researchers say the effect of child care quality is consistent with other evidence showing that early experiences matter to a child's language development. But, they say, parenting is a much more important predictor of a child's development. The report appears in the current issue of Child Development. It tracked...

A much-anticipated report from the largest and longest-running study of American child care has found that keeping a preschooler in a day care center for a year or more increased the likelihood that the child would become disruptive in class ? and that the effect persisted through the sixth grade. The finding held up regardless of the child's sex or family income, and regardless of the quality of the day care center. With more than 2 million U.S. preschoolers attending day care, the increased disruptiveness very likely contributes to the load on teachers who must manage large classrooms, the authors...

How nurseries 'still breed aggression' By Sarah Womack, Social Affairs Correspondent  Last Updated: 1:15am BST 26/03/2007     Children who spend a lot of time in nursery are more likely to be aggressive and disobedient throughout primary school - no matter how excellent the nursery, according to study published today.Primary school teachers are more likely to say that such children - even at the age of 11 - are still "getting into fights" or "arguing a lot".The findings, from a continuing study of nearly 1,400 children, reignite the debate about whether working women damage their children's health by putting them...

Question One has gained the lion’s share of attention when it comes to the ballot questions (however misleading some of that attention might have been). Understandable, since Questions Two and Three can’t exactly be boiled down to the “wine=good” vs. “wine=bad” talking points. Nevertheless voters will be asked to weigh in on all three initiatives on the statewide ballot tomorrow, and so we offer a recap of the Herald’s views: Question One would allow more grocery stores to sell wine, subject to approval of local licensing authorities. The dire warnings of opponents - including the powerful liquor lobby and the...

BALLOT QUESTION #1 An Initiative Petition for a Law This proposed law would allow local licensing authorities to issue licenses for food stores to sell wine. The proposed law defines a “food store” as a retail vendor, such as a grocery store, supermarket, shop, club, outlet, or warehouse-type seller, that sells food to consumers to be eaten elsewhere (which must include meat, poultry, dairy products, eggs, fresh fruit and produce, and other specified items), and that may sell other items usually found in grocery stores. Holders of licenses to sell wine at food stores could sell wine either on its...

Gov. Schwarzenegger signed legislation Thursday that is intended to give parents and guardians more information about potential problems at licensed child-care facilities. The bill by Assemblyman John J. Benoit, R-Bermuda Dunes, stemmed from the March 2004 drowning of Aryanna Sanchez in an above-ground spa at a Riverside day-care center. A social worker had cited the center's husband-wife operators at least once for leaving the spa uncovered. But Aryanna's mother, Anita Aguilar, never knew of the violation. Under AB 633, child-care centers are required to make available investigative reports and other paperwork, including evidence of the state's intent to pull a...

In the name of the fatherhttp://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/opinion.cfm?id=1033732006 http://tinyurl.com/ozefu DANI GARAVELLI Sun 16 Jul 2006 ONCE upon a time, I believed it didn't matter a whit whether a baby was born into a family with one parent or two. Or with two mothers or two fathers rather than a mother and a father. Why should it? What was important was not the number or gender of the parents, but whether or not they were loving and attentive. That was, of course, before I had any of my own. Now I realise that bringing up children is a challenge even for two well-meaning...

Homeschoolers believe that parents generally provide the best care for children, so when the Wyoming legislature started working on a "Quality Child Care Initiative" this year, homeschoolers got involved. The legislators made quite a few changes as they tried to find some compromise between people who put parents first and those who see the government as the answer to everything. The new law established a "Legislative Oversight Committee" to oversee progress. The Governor appointed a joint task force of the Department of Family Services and the Department of Workforce to make some initial assessments. On Friday, April 28, the Legislative...

According to a recent study by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, it costs a middle-income family $250,000 to raise a child from birth to age 17. And that doesn't include the cost of a college education. In the first year alone, the costs of a baby can reach between $9,000 and $11,000, and most new and expectant parents don't realize the size of the financial burden they are taking on. "Most people are more focused on the schedule disruptions and the exhaustion they will be facing," says Brette McWhorter Sember, a retired lawyer and author of "Your Practical Pregnancy Planner:...

Harper Backs MPs Depiction of Liberal Day Care Plan as "Soviet Style" By John-Henry Westen OTTAWA, April 12, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Liberal MP Omar Alghabra (Mississauga-Erindale) was incensed in the House of Commons yesterday that Conservative MP Cheryl Gallant had compared the Liberal day care plan to "Soviet style" day care. "Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Conservative member for Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke said that the Quebec model of child care, adopted by the former government, was a soviet style child care," protested Alghabra. He demanded Prime Minister Harper apologize for the remarks. Gallant on April 10, said in the Commons, "It has...

Tories offer child care payment $1,200 for each child under six Allan Woods, CanWest News Service (via National Post) December 5, 2005 OTTAWA -- A Conservative government would scrap child-care agreements the Liberals have signed with 10 provinces and bring in a system of $1,200-per-child payment for families with preschoolers coupled with a $250-million tax credit for businesses and employers to create 125,000 new child care spaces over five years, Stephen Harper said Monday. Families with children younger than six would receive a $100 payment each month to use as they see fit, Harper said, contrasting it with the...

Our 2-year-old has a new bedtime routine. "Noda," she says pleadingly. "Wanna go downstairs and watch Noda." "Noda," I'm almost embarrassed to admit, is Yoda. As in "Star Wars." As in funny little green Jedi master. "We can't watch Noda now," I tell her in my soothing, all-knowing mom voice. "Noda's sleeping. You need to sleep, too." During the day, we frequently talk about Yoda. As in, about once every 15 minutes. She imitates Yoda, using a squeaky high-pitched voice. When she sits down at her art table to color, she immediately hands me a crayon and orders me to...

Official: babies do best with motherYvonne RobertsSunday October 2, 2005ObserverOne of the longest and most detailed studies of UK childcare has concluded that young children who are looked after by their mothers do significantly better in developmental tests than those cared for in nurseries, by childminders or relatives. The study on children from birth to three will reignite the controversy over the best way to bring up young children. It found babies and toddlers fared worst when they were given group nursery care. Those cared for by friends or grandparents or other relatives did a little better while those looked...

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. Ten years after the U.S. started talking about "family values," many wonder why we are still unable to provide decent education, health care and opportunity for all of our children. Recently, I joined a study team of child care professionals who spent two weeks in France, under the auspices of the French-American Foundation. What we saw was a coordinated, comprehensive system, supported across the political spectrum, that links day care, early education and healthcare - and is accessible to virtually every child. In France, virtually all home-based day care providers are licensed, receive benefits including social...

One evening, after watching Homer Simpson wreck the family car at a monster-truck rally and plunge on a skateboard into Springfield Gorge, my 6-year-old son asked me, "Why are dads on TV so dumb?" Having grown up with the omniscient fathers on "Leave It to Beaver" and "My Three Sons," I wanted to give a bemused yet authoritative answer, chuckling wisely as I explained the ways of the world. But this question left me feeling more like Homer Simpson. Where did we fathers go wrong? We spend twice as much time with our kids as we did two decades ago,...

LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas (AP) -- A 3-year-old boy died after being left in a day-care van for hours while the temperature was in the 90s, and the driver was charged with manslaughter, police said Tuesday.

Do you work long hours? Are your kids spending more time with their grandparents or the at the babysitter's than with you? Well, according to a Bristol University study, children aged below two years, who are left under the care of their grandparents or close family friends, are not likely to flourish at school. On the other hand, children left with paid carers are more likely to come out with flying colours in future. Researchers examined 7,000 children born in the Avon district in 1991 and 1992 from birth until they were seven years old. The 'significant' detrimental effects when...

“Man and Woman”, “Wife”, “Husband”, “Widow”, “Widower” Banished From all Ontario Law Terms, when referring to spouses, are banned from all government programs, services, documentsToronto, February 25, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) – With the obscenely rapid, three-day introduction and passage of its same-sex “marriage” Bill 171, the Ontario government has advanced a revolutionary change in the way all laws and government programs and institutions refer to marriage and married persons. Everything referring to spouses must now be gender neutral. No longer can a married couple be referred to as “husband and wife” or “man and woman”. The terms “Widow” and “widower” are...

Code: ZE05012901Date: 2005-01-29Home Alone -- and UnhappyReflections on the State of U.S. ChildrenSTANFORD, California, JAN. 29, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Concern over problems facing the younger generation is nothing new. A recent book, however, links juvenile difficulties with another controversial subject: changes in family structures. Commentator and author Mary Eberstadt, a part-time research fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution, argues that for some years now there has been an "historically unprecedented experiment in family-child separation in which the United States and other advanced societies are now engaged." In her recent book, "Home-Alone America," Eberstadt explains that there have been two main causes...

Fathers in Sweden are discriminated against while mothers cash in on child benefit says Berit Andnor, Swedish Minister for Social Affairs. And now it’s high time to rewrite the rules. As reported in Thursday’s newspapers, Andnor has asked the Swedish Social Insurance Office (Försäkringskassan) to investigate a change in the child benefit system and a report is expected in March this year. "It’s important that all legislation is equal between the sexes," she told Swedish news agency TT. "It’s a matter of principle." Sweden’s child benefit legislation dates from 1947 at a time when, according to Andnor, "one assumed that...

Back home at the stove and washing machines we're seeing exactly no progress toward the unionization of wives and mothers. You'd think today's socialists would be a little more cautious when it comes to preaching about the merits of centralized planning, a bit more wary about putting the state in charge of every nook and cranny of daily life, given the way things have turned out over the past century.

Third World nannies are a dangerous thing ... they can bring down the most powerful of people ___ Nineteen seventy-two was a good year for Jonathan Gathorne-Harvey to publish The Rise and Fall of the British Nanny. At the time it seemed reasonable to write that the institution and the 'unnatural' relationships it bred were dying. Winston Churchill had far greater feelings of tenderness to his Nanny Everest than his parents. She adored him and called him 'my lamb'. When she died Churchill said she 'had been my dearest and most intimate friend during the whole of the 20 years...

What will you do? ...when this is the headline in your local paper informing you that your child's day care provider has staged a walk-out to put pressure on you and your employer to capitualte to demands of an otherwise unrelated Union? It is coming to your State complements of the thugs at the SEIU. The Local 503 in Portland has been pressuring our provider to join their union. This is the third time, they have approached her, this time leaving her a flyer today to that effect. It states the following: Speaking Out For The ChildrenIt's time for family...

Working parents could have a personal adviser to help them find childcare and negotiate flexible working with their employer under a scheme being considered by the government. Parent Direct would offer telephone helplines and a face-to-face service to help millions of working parents who say that they do not know where to find the information to help them juggle work and family responsibilities, said Patricia Hewitt, the secretary for trade and industry. The idea, still in its earliest stages, emerged both from nationwide round-table discussions led by the Department of Trade and Industry and in the Labour party's Big Conversation...

Redmond, Washington, Apr. 13 (LifesiteNews.com/CWN) - A Redmond, Washington, organization of day care professionals has begun to advocate the normalization of the homosexual lifestyle to pre-school children in day care. The Childcare Exchange has two articles on its website exploring the possible methods to teach very small children to accept and practice homosexual behavior and cross-dressing. One article, "Healthy Sexuality Development in Young Children," recommends allowing boys and girls to wear opposite sex clothing in "dramatic play centers," and "stories will be read that include a variety of family configurations." The authors recommend teaching day care children about masturbation saying,...

Universal, free preschool for all 4-year-olds in California: Sounds great, especially if you're a working parent shelling out thousands of dollars a year for preschool and child care. Let the state pay for it. But most middle-class children don't need preschool to reach their full potential. Poor children need a lot more -- high-quality, high-cost, full- day child care starting well before the age of 4. Californians want state-funded preschool, concluded a survey by First 5 California, the state commission created in 1998 by Proposition 10 (the cigarette tax surcharge) to fund programs for young children. Sixty percent of those...

ATLANTA (Reuters) - A U.S. soldier's wife who was accidentally exposed to the live virus in the smallpox vaccine likely passed it on to her baby through breast-feeding, according to military authorities. The incident, which occurred in May 2003 as the U.S. military was inoculating hundreds of thousands of soldiers against smallpox, is the first documented case of third-hand transmission of vaccinia virus through breast-feeding. Vaccinia is not smallpox, but a pox-like virus related to the rare and deadly virus. Cases of accidental transmission are rare, usually occurring through direct contact with a vaccinated person's unhealed vaccination site. In a...

Yes, child care crisis is real: Mike But says city can't afford more programs By LISA L. COLANGELO and JOANNE WASSERMANDAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS Leny Arriola leaves her two teen children and 10-year-old alone after school but desperately needs care for her infant. When money was cut, so was Adryanna's free care, frustrating mom Karinna Fermin. Joann Girard is seven months pregnant with twins. Because she missed an appointment with Brooklyn ACS officials when her son was in the hospital, she may be left without child care for the 4-year-old boy. Mayor Bloomberg conceded yesterday what every New York...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Thousands of low-income parents who want child care for their kids can't foot the bill. Many of those parents are trying to make the switch from welfare to work. Many states have long waiting lists of low-income families seeking subsidies but are cutting back on assistance because of budget problems. Gina Lodge,Tennessee's commissioner of human services, said there are many needs "vying for the same dollars." Federal funding of nearly $5 billion per year is crucial to major child-care programs. Democrats and some moderate Republicans in Congress say a multibillion-dollar funding increase is needed. But the Bush...

<p>More grandparents than ever are raising their grandchildren and a significant portion of them are living in poverty, the Census Bureau said in a report released yesterday.</p> <p>About 19 percent of grandparent caregivers lived below the poverty line in 1999, compared with 14 percent of all families living with children.</p>

On the bulletin board at my frantic Gymboree in Los Angeles there are flyers, business cards, and tear-off slips for services targeted at every brand of overbooked, underappreciated post-feminist new mother. There are lactation support groups, baby yoga classes, eco-friendly housecleaners, Reiki-trained doulas, and a service that takes the notion of mother's helper to a whole new level: "Nanny and Me: For your caregiver and child—courses in Spanish that lovingly teach your Latina nanny the customs and daily practices of Jewish culture." This would be ripe fodder for Arlie Russell Hochschild, a sociologist and the author of The Second Shift...

Episcopalian bishop-elect Gene Robinson has some curious affiliations. by Fred Barnes 08/04/2003 2:48:00 PM Fred Barnes, executive editor THE CONTROVERSIAL gay Episcopal bishop-elect of New Hampshire is a founder of a group called Outright that supports gay, lesbian, or "questioning" young people 22-years-old or younger and gets them together with older gay and lesbian role models. On its website, Outright had a link to a pornographic website--until the link became an issue in the fight at the Episcopal Church's national convention in Minneapolis over ratifying the election of the bishop-elect, Gene Robinson, by New Hampshire Episcopalians. The link, indeed all...

<p>WOBURN -- A woman who repeatedly defied state orders to close her business was charged yesterday with shaking a 3-month-old to death in what appears to be the first murder charge ever brought against a Massachusetts day-care operator.</p> <p>With her husband and family members sitting behind her, Ann Power, 54, of Reading, pleaded not guilty yesterday in Woburn District Court. She was released on $10,000 bail and declined to comment as she left the court.</p>

By Wendy Thermos and Monte Morin, Times Staff Writers The foster mother of the children who died of heat exposure when they were left unattended for five hours in a sport utility vehicle outside a day care center in Lancaster was arrested late Tuesday, authorities said. Leslie Sue Smoot was booked at nearly midnight and charged with child cruelty. She was held in lieu of $100,000 bail, said Los Angeles County Sheriff's Deputy Darren Harris. The boys, 3 and 5, were the foster children of the day-care center's owner, Smoot, who at first told police that a miscommunication led to...

Girl left alone at night in Gwinnett child aid office By BETH WARREN The Atlanta Journal-Constitution A 13-year-old girl in foster care was left alone at night inside the Lawrenceville headquarters of the Gwinnett Department of Family and Children Services. A police officer, responding to an alarm at the Northdale Road building, found the frightened child at 2:28 a.m. Thursday. "It's very alarming," said Reneé Huie, a spokeswoman for the Georgia Department of Human Resources, the agency that oversees DFCS offices across the state. "I do not know of it ever happening before." Two caseworkers from child protective services have...

<p>LOS ANGELES(AP) - Hundreds of people, many with youngsters in tow, rallied Monday to demand that Gov. Gray Davis spare child care programs from the state budget ax.</p> <p>Day care operators, former welfare mothers and urban activists waved paper cutouts of children, some dressed in baby clothes, at the downtown protest.</p>