Reducing Child Abuse in Daycares Through Background Checks and Hiring Policies

A Social Problem to Tackle

Child abuse in daycares and nurseries is a significant concern affecting children’s health, prospects, and social wellness. Nearly 300 million youngsters between the ages of two and four regularly endure physical or psychological abuse from their parents and caregivers (Yang et al., 2019). This issue must be addressed because, in addition to the physical harm it can do, it can leave children with deep psychological scars and lead to serious social problems like learning underachievement and delinquency, contributing to the reasons why I want to deal with this issue.

The Policy Design and Analysis

Many parents are forced to leave their children in the care of others since many households have only one parent. Regrettably, not all daycare centers provide young children with a secure and loving environment, and child maltreatment does occur. The abuse endangers the child’s health and causes social problems, but parents may have the legal right to claim damages if they discover their child is being abused.

My goal will be to introduce background checks in daycare centers to try to reduce child abuse cases in those facilities. This will help monitor the kind of caregivers these institutions hire and ultimately help lower the number of child abuse cases. My policy aims to reduce child abuse cases and help the daycare facilities hire caring and nurturing caregivers to deal with the children. I want to target their hiring process.

1. Run background checks on potential hires to see whether they have any convictions and screenings to look for substance misuse or a history of emotional instability.
2. Create a system where daycares can confirm a potential employee’s résumé or job application details. This will help them determine whether an individual is a perfect fit for the position. Therefore, having the caregivers’ location and social security number will play a huge role in knowing what kind of people to employ.
3. Daycare facilities should run employment checks on prospective employees to safeguard the kids from abuse. Pre-employment background checks are a crucial component of most organizations’ hiring processes. Still, it is also essential for daycares to have a policy in place, review it frequently, and update it as regulations change (Feely et al., 2020). A well-written pre-employment screening policy can assist the centers in making sure that their background check process is standardized, comprehensive, and compliant with all applicable regulations.
4. To safeguard against potential liability, daycares should also adopt fair background check policies. Additionally, background checks on daycare employees should be conducted regularly with the BCC’s consent or per applicable laws, rules, or other standards. The daycares should determine the need for any background check that is not required by this policy (Feely et al., 2020). Before the background check is processed, any such requests must follow this policy, supported by a rationale, and have the BCC’s approval in conjunction with the Office of Legal Affairs.

As explained above, social connections are particularly challenging for abused children throughout the toddler and school years. Constructive peer interactions in daycares may serve as a source of support for children who have been the victims of abuse. Recent studies have shown that discontinuity in displays of wariness from birth to toddlerhood is connected with early exposure of temperamentally abused child victims to peers of the same age (Yang et al., 2019).

Background policies might focus on identifying child abusers, but by promoting positive relationships and social skills in challenging social circumstances, the social problems of abused children may be reduced. Child abuse significantly negatively influences children’s mental health and social development. As part of their obligations to prevent and address child abuse, daycares should also create rules and policies. The finest strategies to assist parents in creating an atmosphere where children may thrive deserve to be the theme of vigorous discussion in front of the public.

References

Feely, M., Raissian, K. M., Schneider, W., & Bullinger, L. R. (2020). The social welfare policy landscape and Child Protective Services: Opportunities for and barriers to creating systems synergy. The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 692(1), 140–161. Web.

Yang, M. Y., Maguire‐Jack, K., Showalter, K., Kim, Y. K., & Slack, K. S. (2019). Child care subsidy and child maltreatment. Child & Family Social Work, 24(4), 547–554. Web.