Angelika Mayr and her staff dragged tables and chairs, disinfected toys and moved them from one room to the other. They converted function rooms into group rooms, all in one day. Because since last Monday they have been looking after the 48 children in their crèche again in fixed groups, no longer in the open concept, as they actually do here. The city of Munich stipulated this in a general decree, only on the previous Friday.
Angelika Mayr has been working in a daycare center for 31 years; she heads the children’s world of the Paritätischer Wohlfahrtsverband. Children from a few months to three years of age, whose parents work at the Großhadern Clinic, are looked after there. For the parents, the new regulation of the city of Munich means one thing above all: two hours less care time per day. “We don’t have enough staff to look after the children in fixed groups from 6.30 a.m. to 5 p.m.,” says Angelika Mayr.
Since the end of May, the daycare centers in Munich have been back to normal operations after months of emergency care. But that’s over, the Munich general decree is even stricter than the Bavarian regulation, which allows groups to be merged for personal reasons at off-peak times. The reports of corona cases in the daycare centers are increasing, but the infection process is less dynamic than in the older age groups, according to the health department (GSR). Schools and daycare centers should remain open, even with the currently very high incidences, Prime Minister Markus Söder emphasized in his press conference on Friday. In the day care centers and day care centers, too, children are now to be looked after in fixed groups again.
The list of closed daycare centers in Munich is getting longer, on Monday last week groups in 75 daycare centers were closed, on Thursday in 95 daycare centers, on Friday there were groups in 108 daycare centers; 196 corona cases were reported from these in the first two weeks of November. In Munich, however, there are almost 1500 daycare centers. In the majority of cases, employees, not children, were infected. The GSR specifies the ratio as three to two.
Parents can pick up authorization certificates for tests at the day care center
Prime Minister Söder announced at his press conference on Friday that pool tests will gradually be introduced in the daycare centers. Tests like those already taken in elementary and special schools. Because at the moment, the day-care centers are tested at very different levels of intensity.
One thing is clear: Unvaccinated employees have to test themselves three times a week, otherwise they are not allowed to come to work, in some facilities they test themselves daily. The tests are voluntary for day-care children, parents can pick up authorization certificates at the day-care center, now for three self-tests a week. The daycare managers have to document this – which means additional work.
“The workload for the facility management and the employees in the daycare centers increased enormously during the pandemic,” says Raymond Walke, managing director of Parikita, a subsidiary of the Paritätische and sponsor of 28 daycare centers in Munich. “Every additional bureaucratic effort means even less time to work with the children, for whom a normal day-to-day daycare is the most important thing.” Only between five and 20 percent of parents picked up the entitlement certificates at the Parikita facilities, he says. The head of another daycare center speaks of a third of the parents, in other facilities almost everyone takes advantage of the offer.
On Thursday last week, the city of Munich stuck to the decision not to introduce any PCR pool tests at daycare centers. City school council Florian Kraus said that free and public sponsors had made this decision together. “Since participation in the tests is also voluntary in the PCR pool tests and samples are taken outside the day-care center, this test procedure in the day-care centers in Munich would not necessarily result in greater protection and security.” He said that, but with the addition that the corona situation is developing dynamically and the currently valid measures are constantly being reassessed because the requirements of the Free State or the political will-formation can change accordingly.
Caritas knows which employees are vaccinated and which are not
First of all, testing continues as before. “Not all parents pick up their entitlement certificates,” says Irmgard Löffler, specialist service manager at the Caritas children’s home in St. Jakob. But if you test your child, you will also present the result. In the parent-child initiative (EKI) Dragon Egg, almost all parents are now getting their tickets, says Monika Griebeler from the EKI Board of Directors. Parents do not have to prove negative test results. “As a parents ‘initiative, we trust the parents’ sense of responsibility. That has worked well so far.”
So far, they have gotten off lightly, says Griebeler. They would never have had a group in quarantine – until Thursday last week. One child had tested positive, confirmed by a PCR test, and now both daycare groups are closed. Both groups because the children meet in the hallway and in the bathroom, even if they are looked after in fixed groups. As for the vaccination quota: Most of the staff is vaccinated.
Caritas knows which employees are vaccinated and which are not. But, according to the press spokeswoman, does not keep statistics about it. The Caritas appeals to the employees to get vaccinated and release them for vaccination appointments. A spokeswoman said to pay attention to the vaccination status when hiring new staff, because they could not afford that given the shortage of skilled workers in the daycare area.
In the Minihaus Munich, a private daycare center with several facilities, the staff is only not vaccinated in individual cases, says the technical manager Günther Hanel. “We notice that something has changed in the last few weeks.” The facilities are still able to offer care during off-peak times, even if they repeatedly struggle with staff shortages – because of all kinds of infections, not just because of Corona. “We have to plan very carefully, that’s a great organizational challenge.” Yes, the corona cases have also increased in the past few weeks, says Hanel. But moderate.
What particularly bothers Angelika Mayr, the head of the day care center in Großhadern, about the whole thing with the fixed groups is that she can no longer support the children across groups in age groups. “The project work with the two- to three-year-olds is no longer necessary.” Language promotion is not possible with the masks anyway, the children do not recognize facial expressions. The small children in particular are confused by the changes and reacted, for example, to the pick-up and drop-off situation with crying. That in turn unsettles the parents. And the trouble – the staff get it off.