THE ABSOLUTE WORST PROGRAM FOR YOUR KIDS.

YMCA After School Care Incident: My 5 year old daughter attended the YMCA After School Care Program at her Elementary School. We thought this would be great considering the fun activities and our work schedule. One day my daughter came home crying because a boy (who is in the 3rd grade) bullied her. That day, she dressed up as a princess because her teacher loved to do fun things with her class. During the YMCA program, the boy ripped a metal necklace off of my daughter’s neck, scratched her arm, broke her tiara, and pushed her. He also took off her ring and tried to throw it away but one of the other students stopped him. To make matters worse, my daughter told her YMCA supervisors what happened and they did NOTHING. AND, they didn’t witness what happened even though this was under their supervision. I reached out to Ms. Karina (The YMCA After School Program Director) to express my concerns of this matter and she said she would look further into it, i have not heard from her since. This incident happened in May. Luckily, my daughter’s principal acted fast and scheduled a meeting with us to get it all figured out especially since the boy was still a student at The Elementary School. Feeling neglected by the YMCA, my partner and i went to the school ourselves to speak with the YMCA supervisors. The manager, Lauren, basically explained that she was not watching my daughter’s age group and is unaware of what happened. The other supervisor (I forgot her name), was watching over my daughter’s age group but she was not paying attention because she was tending to a child that was crying at the time. I asked her what she did once my daughter told her what happened and she admitted that she did nothing. Her reasoning was because it was my daughter’s friend that told her what happened and that my daughter didn’t tell her herself…..My daughter said because she was in tears…The supervisor then further explained that the boy had mental health issues, was held back in school, and is a loner due to his medical issues and that he is 7 years old. Violation of HIPPA. Mind you, we didn’t ask for that information at all. Furthermore, the supervisor was extremely rude and tried to gaslight my daughter even though there were other kids that witnessed what happened and she ignored them. (This entire conversation was recorded)

YMCA Summer Program Incident: My daughter now is in the YMCA summer program. She loves the activities that they do everyday and it’s perfect for my partner and I’d work schedule once again. On Friday, June 14th, my daughter informed us that a manager on campus by the name of Eric, forced all the kids to say curse words. The kids kept insisting that it was a bad word and that refused to say it. Eric then pressured them again by saying “say it you’re not going to get in trouble.” By this time, all the kids did what he asked except for my daughter. She told Eric that she felt uncomfortable and that it’s a very bad word to say. Eric began to pressure her once again and said “you better say it now. Just say it! You’re not going to get in trouble.” My daughter once again refused, but she felt that something bad would happen if she didn’t do what he said so finally, she said it but she felt horrible afterwards. After, apparently one of her teachers came and told him to go away but that was all that we were told. Another worry is what would’ve happened if her teacher wasn’t there…

This is absolutely unacceptable. I don’t even leave bad reviews because I don’t like being that person but we never received a phone call regarding both incidents that happened. We found out from our 5 year old… I would NOT recommend the YMCA for your little ones. It seems like it’s staffed with a bunch of young adults that don’t take their jobs seriously. for over $200 a week?! For my kid to be bullied and harassed by the people who are under their care is insanity and is extremely discomforting. I don’t know how else to get the directors attention at this point.