Happy Home Child Learning Center

My son has been in the Busy Bee classroom since September 7, 2015. I find Happy Home to be a wonderful learning experience for my child. We toured a lot of facilities and found that many times the people who were tasked with looking after my son looked dirty, unkempt, and just very trashy. I was impressed with our discussion with the Owner Dr. Tillman and even more impressed with the Director, Ms. Cortes. Happy Home has the NAEYC Accreditation that means that their teachers have undergraduate degrees or the CDA with a certain number of years experience. I do not know what NAEYC stands for… Sorry.
Each morning, the children have worship. I love that aspect of the school. Every time my son arrives at school he reaches for Ms. Cortes or his teacher Ms. Rabia. There is no fear or apprehension. I have done drop ins unannounced and have not seen any issues. This is a very diverse school. I love that my son is in class with students of varying ethnicities and languages. I also love that he has teachers of varying ethnicities. I also appreciate having a uniform for the children. It is a simple shirt, but it reduces all of the anxiety and management you have to execute when dressing your child every day.
The center provides breakfast (even though we are too late to get it), snack, and lunch every day. Lunch is not provided on Friday. However, what I love… They have a VEGETARIAN OPTION for my VEGETARIAN CHILD :-).
Cons:
Hours — Happy Home closes promptly at 6pm with a late fee of $ 5/​minute for the first 30 minutes you are late. Sometimes in the DMV, the traffic can be so bad and there is no real accommodation for that. My husband and I are working professionals with pretty demanding jobs. I would love it if Happy Home had extended day care or after hours care.
Communication — They could do a better job emailing announcements and reminders to parents. If you miss a day at the school with pick up you may miss vital information about the upcoming school day. I would recommend the Director send a weekly email with updates to the parents.
Location — I hate Southern Towers. If you have been there you know what I am talking about. That being said, the center is much larger than it appears and it has a nice playground.
I really enjoy sending my child to Happy Home. He is thriving, he does not have any weird cuts and bruises, and I find the location to be clean and tidy every day. The teachers have more training that the centers in other places that charge $ 200 — $ 300 more per week. I guess that is the best part. I feel like my son has a great experience and I pay LESS THAN $ 300/​week for a 1 year old.

This place is the worst. My husband and I are very glad to have taken our son out of there. He’s much happier at the daycare we have him in now.
I can relate to the injury reports, or lack there of. My son would come home with unexplained bruises and scratches, but because we didn’t strip him down and checked every part of his body before we left the daycare, they were not held responsible.
Every time we would pick him up, most the kids were crying, clothes dirty while the teachers sat on the floor just watching them. The only thing they were good at and consistent with was collecting tuition.