Community Day Nursery

“A draft of form 990 is reviewed by executive director then distributed to, and reviewed by the board of trustees prior to the form being filed. The form 990 is discussed with a question and answer period prior to the final board approval. Upon approval, the form 990 is submitted to the internal revenue service.”

“The organization requires annual conflicts of interest statements from all board members. These statements are reviewed by the president and executive director of the organization. All board members are required to disclose any conflicts of interest.”

“Compensation for the organization's executive director is determined by the new jersey department of education contract. Other salaries are determined by the executive director and treasurer and are based on similar agencies and programs. There are no other top management, officers, or key employees compensated within the organization.”

“The governing documents, conflict of interest policy and financial statments are always available to the public at the organization's office or by request.”

“(continued from from 990, page 1) offering a high quality full day preschool education to the children of east orange, new jersey. Community day nursery has been serving children and their families since 1897. We believe high-quality early childhood education ensures children to be ready for kindergarten and beyond. We are accredited by the national association for the education of young children which means we meet the high standards set to ensure children will be safe, healthy, and learning each day. Our certified teachers have degrees and are well trained in early childhood. They build caring relationships with each child, and plan activities that are fun and challenging. Ongoing assessment ensures children continue to learn and develop.”

“(continued from form 990, page 2 line 1) it is our goal to strengthen a cooperative partnership with families through a variety of parenting services and group activities.”

“(continued from form 990, page 2 line 4a) community day nursery (cdn) has now been providing early education and child care services for this community for 120 years. The economic climate continues to challenge our commitment to high-quality services. The severely restricted state funding, nj dept of human services (njdhs) has resulted in a significant reduction in operating funds. The regulations, originally adopted in 2011 by the njdhs, had been revised in 2014 & seriously restrict access to childcare subsidies for our families who need childcare before & after school (7am until 8:30am & 3pm until 6pm). We have seen this "wrap-around subsidy" for the childcare portion of our day/year go from 100% participation for all 120 families during the first 7 years of the public preschool program to our current enrollment of 24 children qualifying for december 2016. To further complicate matters, the new system determining eligibility does so for a period ranging from 2 weeks to several months. Also, the subsidy can be stopped without any notice in the event a parent is not working or in school for the required number of hours. This makes estimating revenue for the budget difficult. The model for childcare services throughout the state provides payment to childcare facilities for 4 hours per day (before and aftercare) no matter how much time the families actually need their child to be in care. Some of our children are here before school from 7am until school starts at 9 and after school from 3pm until we close at 6pm. In order to be responsive to our families, we have offered a "menu" of childcare services, so a family needing childcare before school doesn't have to pay for the after school portion of the program & vice versa. We now have parents who are paying for wrap-around care, & who have qualified for subsidies. Next month we may have more or fewer who will qualify for state aid, but based on our demographic, probably not more than 20% at any given time. When the nj dept of education originally estimated the affect the change in regulations would have, they estimated that our wrap-around population would be at 50%. During the past 2 years we have continued to see a large number of childcare centers closing in essex county due to these reductions in funding. This has been the most chaotic year in the last decade & a half in terms of enrollment. Our full enrollment number is 120 and we have not been able to reach that number since june 2016. We have also experienced an unheard of number of departures & new enrollees. January through june we had 120 children attending the school. Currently 110 3 and 4 year old east orange residents attend school here from 8:30am until 3pm. The majority of our children, 82, are of african american descent. 5 are african, 16 are hispanic, 5 are caribbean, 1 british & 1 arab. There are 60 girls and 50 boys enrolled, 97% are families qualifying for free or reduced meals through the fda child & adult care food program. We currently have 4 bilingual spanish/english classrooms & 1 haitian creole/english class (of 8 classes) as the latino population in east orange has been growing. Because of the number of spanish-speaking staff we employ, including a family activity coordinator, parents feel welcomed & cared for when they enter our building. The sisters, brothers & cousins of children that attended cdn continue to request our center when enrolling. In 3 classrooms the lead teacher is bilingual with an english-speaking assistant & in the 4th class the teacher assistant is bilingual/spanish with an english-speaking lead teacher. We also have additional teacher assistants & an administrative assistant on staff who are bilingual haitian creole-english. During the summer of 2016, 56 children attended our summer camp from june 27-august 26. We also welcomed back children who had finished kindergarten in june in addition to our 3 & 4 year olds. Our license from the state of nj allows us to care for children fro”

“Program for parents: our family workers continue to host monthly parent meetings using the parenting now! Curriculum purchased in march 2003. Some topics are: family values, discipline tools, stress and communicating with your child. We are continuing our literacy enhancement program made possible through grants provided by first book, a nonprofit organization that connects book publishers and community organizations to provide access to new books for children in need. Much research regarding the racial and ethnic school readiness gaps indicate that quality parental linguistic interaction in the home is crucial to readiness at school entry and further academic success. One of the indicators of success in school readiness used by many researchers is the number of the books in the home. We want our families to have high-quality early childhood literature available for their children. Each year during january we send home martin's big words by doreen rappaport. It is a beautifully illustrated and elegantly told story of the rev dr martin luther king jr appropriate for young children. On back to school night, held september 20th this year, 62 parents came to their child's classroom to meet with the teaching team & learn how to support the early learning experience. Each family went home with a book, all by myself by mercer mayer, to help build their child's home library. Parents learned about the tools of the mind curriculum as well as how they can support their child's learning at home. Also, this december we sent home the preschool children's classic mouse paint by ellen stoll walsh. This new edition is printed in both english and spanish. We have continued our collaboration with the east orange public library to make it easy for parents to get library cards for their children. They fill out the paperwork with us and we get the cards & hand them out along with book lists suggesting excellent early childhood literature. On october 28, 2016 we hosted our 10th annual family dinner. We had 72 family members (including the siblings & grandparents) in attendance. Each family contributed a dish (or whatever they could manage, sometimes a loaf of bread or a bag of pretzels) & we provided fun craft activities for the children. After dinner, the board of trustees judged the dishes & awarded small prizes. We have found this time together builds relationships between the school & our families in an informal, non-judgmental setting. Our parents' participation in the parent teacher conferences varied by class with an overall participation rate of 63%. However, two of our bilingual spanish classes had over 80% participation buildings and grounds: through a generous grant from turrell fund we were able to replace the carpeting in the lobby & install new stair treads from the lobby to the second floor. This year we also replaced two classrooms' plexiglas floor to ceiling windows with energy efficient, double paned, tempered glass. The difference in both classroom temperatures & upgraded appearance were realized immediately. For more information about the school, please visit our website at: www.cdneo.org”

“The organization has a committee that is responsible for overseeing the audit of the financial statements and the selection of the independent accountant that audited the financial statements. This process has not changed from the prior year.”