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On-site childcare is an ever-increasing form of childcare. By understanding the decisions, experiences and feelings of mothers using on-site centers, informed policy decisions about viable childcare models can be made. In the broadest terms current literature reveals that economic, societal, functional, and psychological factors influence a mother's decisions in regards to using childcare. This study used these markers as the basis for the development of questions to ascertain the experiences, feelings and decisions of mothers using on-site childcare. A phenomenological method was used. Twenty-four participants using on-site childcare from four organizations in different industries were located through a snowball sample for in-depth interviews. The interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, and coded to derive themes of experiences. The findings reveal that on-site childcare impacts previously described effects of childcare. The factors of primary influence are child proximity and organizational support. The influence of close proximity can be seen in the themes of Networking, Organizational System Oneness, Family/Community Perception, Mothering Style, Center Quality, Work Time, Commuting Time, Nursing/Lactation, Guilt, Stress Management, and Employee Loyalty. Organizational assistance and support impact and overlap with proximity as a primary theme source. This can be seen in the themes of Cost, Networking, Organizational System Oneness, Waiting List, Center Quality, Work Time, Commuting Time, Nursing/Lactation, Stress Management and Employee Loyalty. The quality of the childcare, which in large part is made possible by the supporting organization, is held in such high regard that in some cases it overcomes the mother's desire for proximity. The implications of these findings are that high quality on-site childcare provides a significant benefit for mothers, organizations and communities. Family friendly organizational policy and feminist urban planning methods are better informed.

The purpose of this study was to investigate preschool and child care directors' perceptions about the potential for introducing family therapy-related services into a child care or preschool environment, and in particular, to explore their opinions about the extent to which children are affected by parental stress, to assess directors' awareness of the field of marriage and family therapy, to determine the extent of their current collaboration with family therapists or other mental health providers, and to gather their thoughts concerning the possibility of successfully bridging the professions of child care and family therapy in the future. Seventy-two of the 197 directors surveyed responded to the mailed questionnaire. Descriptive statistics were used for the quantitative data, while the qualitative data was evaluated using the method of content analysis. Quantitative results revealed: 1) Most of the participants believed that children are at least somewhat affected by their parents' stress, 2) Over half of the participants were familiar with marriage and family therapists as trained professionals who focus on systemic treatment of the family as a whole unit, 3) Less than half of the participants currently offer on-site mental health services, 4) While it seems that participants routinely refer parents to and consult with mental health providers, they are least likely to consult with or refer to marriage and family therapists, and 5) Almost all of the participants identified at least one obstacle to providing family therapy-related services in their child care centers or preschools. Limitations and implications for clinicians and future research are also discussed. / Master of Science

In order to give children quality child care, child care providers need appropriate training and coaching to develop effective teaching practices. Compared to center-based educators, family child care providers tend to have less education and training and offer fewer educational experiences. The purpose of this study was to investigate how family child care providers perceived the quality of Early Head Start training to support professional development, and to identify what professional areas and experiences or activities providers deemed crucial to their professional-development training. Bandura’s (1997) social-cognitive theory described the way people learn from each other, and identified four factors—mastery experiences, vicarious experiences, social persuasion, and psychological factors—that are related to self-efficacy. Interview questions and observational coding of teacher training pertained in part to Early Head Start trainees’ experiences of social-learning and self-efficacy during training.

Corporate leaders at Dominion Bankshares Corporation established an on-site child care facility at its operations center for its Roanoke, Virginia employees. The immediate supervisors of parents of children enrolled in the Dominion Child Development Center were surveyed to determine the factors they believed affected worker productivity and their perceptions of how employees' work habits had changed as a result of the opening of the child care center. A description of the demographic characteristics of persons who supervise employees who use Dominion Bank's Child Development Center is included. The supervisors of persons using the on-site child care center were primarily white males from 36 to 45 years old with ten or fewer years experience with the corporation. These supervisors perceived that employee productivity is mostly affected by employee morale, emotional stress level, and absenteeism. Supervisors believed that employee morale, productivity, and absenteeism related to child care improved after the opening of the Dominion Child Development Center. Some corporate leaders call the lack of affordable, licensed child care an economic problem for our society. Many supervisors are not aware that their employees' child care dilemmas affect job performance. Inservice training could provide educational opportunities to improve attitudes and increase awareness. / Master of Science

This research study was designed to evaluate whether or not Gestalt therapy approaches could be used effectively when intervening with aggressive acts in a day care setting. Five focus children were observed at timed intervals as to whether or not they were aggressive, how the caretaker intervened, and how the children responded to the caretaker intervention. After a baseline of aggressive acts was established, caretakers were trained to use Gestalt therapy intervention methods. Comparisons were made to establish whether there were fewer aggressive acts after Gestalt therapy intervention methods were used and if the children responded more positively to these intervention methods. This study suggests that Gestalt therapy intervention methods could be used in a day care setting to effectively deal with children's aggression. / Master of Science

Perceptions of the experience of flow, a concept introduced by Csikszentmihalyi (1975), was examined among child care employees. Teachers (N=192) of 4-year-old children ranked their perceived skills, perceived challenges, happiness, and relaxation on ten activities that typically occur during a day at a child care center. Discrepancy scores were computed by subtracting the challenge rating from the skill rating for each activity, while flow scores were computed as the absolute value of the discrepancy scores. Happiness and relaxation scores were summed to compute a sense of well-being score for each activity. Paired t-tests indicated that respondents, as a group, perceived their skills as exceeding the challenges on all ten of the activities (p<.0001). A series of 2-way ANOVAS with four levels of child development education and three levels of experience revealed that education was significantly related to an increase in (a) perceived skills and perceived challenges with teaching activities F(3,185)=3.38, p<.05 and F(3,185)=3.09, p<.05, (b) perceived challenges in relationship activities F(3,188)=2.80, p<.05, and (c) perceived skills on routine activities F(3,187)=3. 11, p<.05. Years of work experience with children was significantly related to a positive sense of well-being during teaching activities F(2,185)=6.52, p<.05. Paired t-tests indicated that (a) perceived challenges in teaching activities were significantly greater than for relationship activities (p<.05) and routine activities (p<.001); (b) challenges in relationship activities were significantly higher than for routine activities (p<.0001); (c) perceived skills in relationship activities were significantly greater than for routine activities (p<.001); and (d). discrepancy scores between skills and challenges in the relationship and teaching activities were significantly less (higher flow) than for routine activities. Kendall's Tau coefficients showed that perceived skills and sense of well-being for each activity correlated with job satisfaction (p<.01). Kendall's Tau coefficients between perceived skills and sense of well-being were moderate to moderately low (p<.001). One-way ANOVAS found subjects who rated their challenges higher than skills on relationships had a lower sense of well-being than subjects who rated their skills and challenges as equal or their skills greater than the challenges (p<.05). Multiple regression showed sense of well-being as the best predictor of job satisfaction (r²=.25). The best predictor of well-being was skills in relationships (r²=. 13). / M.S.

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published_or_final_version / Urban Planning / Master / Master of Science in Urban Planning

published_or_final_version / Social Work / Master / Master of Social Work