Child care professionals share a commitment to improving society by creating dynamic and nurturing care environments for Australia's youngest learners.
Read this month's Child Care Person in the spotlight Linda Mrocki from Camberwell Junction Early Learning Centre in Victoria.
Linda Mrocki
Camberwell Junction Early Learning Centre VIC
C4K: What is your full name?
LM: My name is Linda Michelle Mrocki and I am 47 years old.
C4K: Which centre do you work in? How many staff and children are in the centre?
LM: I own the Camberwell Junction Early Learning Centre which cares for 60 children per day and I employ15 staff
C4K: What is your professional background and career experience?
LM: I have the Diploma a Social Sciences, have sat on industrial committees, child care association committees in various capacities, National Child Care committees and I also ran my own Child Care Consultancy firm for seven years.
I have managed a centre in Kew and have owned centres in Malvern, Blackburn and East Hawthorn in Melbourne
C4K: What attracted you to a career in child care?
LM: I always had a passion for working with intellectually disadvantaged children but found the work extremely heart wrenching and difficult. I then decided that mothercraft nursing in a maternity hospital would suit, this led to managing child care centres.
At the age of 22 years I purchased my own small 22 place centre in Malvern and then ended up building two centres and running one in Blackburn with my business partner.
C4K: What does a 'normal' day look like for you?
LM: My day is anything from normal. I rise early to get my four children off to school, uni etc after being a normal mum with the school lunch boxes, uniforms, school books etc. I then head into work by 8.30am to be greeted buy staff hassles, children, parents and a million phone calls, students that require direction, staff that require planning time, orders that need to be fulfilled and new potential clients to show through and that is amongst the filing, wages, superannuation, food orders, cleaning etc.
The centre closes at 6.00pm and it is not until then that I breathe a sigh of relief that all the children had a fulfilling day in my centre filled with cuddles and excellent programs and it all begins again tomorrow. Oh I forgot to tell you that the phone can start ringing at 5.30am with sick staff calling me and I have to run to work to open up by 7.15am.
C4K: What makes your centre unique?
LM: We offer a very homely, friendly service. We all know every child, parent and their families. We offer extra curriculum teaching groups on most days of the week, have multicultural staff and a language lesson for the many various cultures that attend as these children often require a long period of adjustment.
We have many siblings with us so we really hope that we are giving these families security and great memories of their early years.
C4K: What are some of the advantages of working in the child care sector?
LM: I am not sure but I hope that my staff go home rewarded. I certainly go home knowing I have put in a good day's work most days but I also worry about what the next day will bring. There is NEVER a dull moment in the day of a child care manager.
C4K: What are some of the biggest challenges facing the child care sector?
LM: The ongoing regulatory changes. We have bureaucrats that seem to know what ratios and care the children that we have been caring for over 30 years now require. They seem to believe that having loads of staff will make care and programming more successful.
My belief is that I could have five qualified staff members in any given room but unless they are the correct type of staff then the number of people will make no difference to the care we give our children.
We have had to deal with accreditation paperwork, when until this day I can honestly say that I have only ever had one client question my accreditation status on any show through since its inception. We now have all the child care benefit rules to contend with and it feels like you need a degree to fully understand it and computer skills to go with it all.
While I welcome and support the financial assistance being given to our families I wish the powers that be would include us in simplifying the process and not placing all the responsibility onto parents who often simply cannot understand the requirements necessary to get their rebates.
C4K: How has your centre changed to deal with these challenges?
LM: We have changed in that I no longer allow staff to assist me with monetary issues and handle all of it myself. This is difficult and I will not ever leave my centre for a few days because I worry about mistakes that might happen that I will have to rectify now that we process weekly.
C4K: How does the industry need to change to adapt to these challenges?
LM: The industry has adapted but just when we think we have done enough we receive new challenges: we receive more NCAC items to abide by, new Jet or AMEP rules to learn about, census and kindergarten funding documents, student documents to complete and so on.
C4K: What advice would you offer someone thinking about a career or looking for a promotion in child care?
LM: Think very carefully, do your homework, if possible manage a centre and work in the rooms for several years first. As for promotions I do appreciate and encourage my staff to all become qualified, attend management courses and begin with 2IC positions. I am always willing to train the right staff to be promoted.
Don't expect much free time! Tomorrow is Saturday and I am off to work to have a clean up day with my staff, prepare a few programs, do the food shopping for next week and all that happens after I attend my children's netball games at 8am, 9.15 and 12pm!
Linda Mrocki
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