CANMORE – The Canmore Community Daycare will reopen this Thursday (Nov. 26) after closing for two weeks after two staff members tested positive for COVID-19.
On Nov. 13, at the direction of Alberta Health Services (AHS), the daycare closed its Roundhouse facility and suspended its junior kindergarten and after-school care programs at Elizabeth Rummel School (ERS) in Canmore.
Executive director Cherri Hodgins said over the past two weeks, there have been no additional positive cases among staff, or children, and all of its classrooms at both facilities have been extensively cleaned and disinfected.
"There have been no more positive cases in our program and I think we responded really quickly to something we are all trying to understand," Hodgins said, adding the staff who were quarantined are no longer COVID positive. "Both staff members are doing well ... I think we caught it quickly and we are fortunate."
She said the decision to close the daycare for a two-week period was a precautionary measure taken by AHS. The week before, a child in the after-school program run at ERS also tested positive.
Children that attend the daycare, or its programs, are screened each day for symptoms, including temperature checks. The daycare was shut during the lockdown earlier this year, and reopened at the beginning of June. Since that time, it has hired a full-time custodian for the Roundhouse and increased the cleaning being done in the rooms it uses at ERS.
"We are not sparing any expense to make sure we are keeping both environments disinfected and sanitized on a daily basis," Hodgins said. "I think we are fortunate that we are financially positioned to weather this storm and I think we have been fortunate to access some of the government programs like other businesses in town and that has helped us."
Unfortunately due to the pandemic, the daycare cancelled the annual fall fair, its major fundraising event. Over the past several years, the daycare has been focused on establishing financial reserves to help in the event it faced an emergency situation, and for a possible expansion project. Hodgins said those funds have helped through this pandemic.
"Our staff have been bar none amazing at working under these new guidelines," Hodgins added. "We have been extremely mindful of the cohorts and we will continue to do that when we reopen.
"As far as the daycare goes, we are going to continue to follow all the protocols. They are changing constantly and we have to be on top of the guidelines on a daily basis."
She said it is clear that the daycare provides an essential service for local families and when parents drop off their children, they are able to trust that they are cared for and don't have to worry.
"I am amazed at how resilient the kids are, I really am," Hodgins said when asked about how the children have been coping through the pandemic. "The kids are doing well in all of this overall. It is nice to see normal play; it is nice to see children come into an environment where their friends are and they can play and just be children.
"Through all of what we are going through, kids still need to play and build relationships with their peers and caregivers."
