Keeping an eye on the kids

Michelle Woo
The Arizona Republic
Oct. 4, 2004 12:00 AM

Like millions who scroll through personal e-mails, book flight reservations online or browse daily headlines, Ashley Hickman admits to a habit of checking on her 17-month-old daughter, Sydney, while sitting at her office computer.

A Webcam monitors the playroom at The Learning Curve preschool in Gilbert, Ariz.

For the Ahwatukee Foothills mom, it's easy to keep the family connected through an Internet video-broadcasting service her day-care center provides. With a user name and password, she can see her baby crawl, snack and toddle through the playroom.

"I have to limit myself on how much I watch," said Hickman, a special-education instructor who allows herself to peek in on her daughter about twice a day. "I'd always think, 'I wonder what Sydney is doing right now.' Then I'd log on and say, 'Oh look, she's napping.' "

The ability to click into her child's life was something that drew Hickman to The Learning Curve (TLC) in Gilbert, which opened in August. After researching countless child-care facilities and taking seven walking tours, she decided to go with the center that offered her peace of mind.

Internet cameras, or Web cams, ease the separation anxieties of working parents while keeping the staff accountable for the safety and care of the children. The service, scarce in the Valley, caters to a growing demand for improved security technology in schools and other day-care facilities.

"We hope to start a technological trend in Arizona," said TLC co-director Joyce Pichler, who founded the center with her husband, Ted."We want to be the future of day care."

The center also uses a biometric fingerprinting device to screen anyone wishing to gain entry into the classroom and playroom area. Only those logged into the system are granted access.

About 300 to 400 U.S. day-care centers have Web cams in place, said John Lewison, general manager of WatchMeGrow, a company that specializes in child-care viewing systems. The company has started reaching out to elementary and high schools that want to kick student monitoring up a notch, providing parents with video proof on whether their kids used lunch money for lunch, goofed off in class or even went to class at all.

"As a mom, I think it's almost ingenious," said Dana Vela, vice president of Sunrise Preschools. The 20-year-old Valley child-care chain incorporated closed-circuit classroom monitoring systems in the '80s as a way to prevent kidnappings and evaluate teachers. Video footage can only be viewed in the school lobbies, not online.

Vela said that the company has no intention of adding Internet capabilities to the system, pointing out that some parents believe the service infringes on family privacy, particularly those with foster kids and children involved in custody battles. She said that many parents come in with lists of people who cannot have any access to their child.

"When you give one person a password, you're giving a lot of other people access as well," Vela said. "If I'm online at work, the person sitting next to me can see how cute my kid is, too."

Hickman said she logs on to the Internet service primarily to check Sydney's eating routines and to see what time she wakes up from her naps, but also to "make sure everybody is doing what they're supposed to be doing," she said. At TLC, Web cams are hidden only in the rooms of babies ages 2 and younger.

"When kids are 3 or 4, they can go home and say, 'Mommy, we did bubbles today,' " said co-director Penny Kovara. "Babies can't articulate that."

The Web cams, each about the size of a smoke detector, capture all the playroom action from the ceilings of the center, giving parents a wide-angle view. Parents cannot hear sounds when watching their children online, and the service does not have zoom capabilities. And changing areas are never shown, which doesn't seem to bother most users.

Infant instructor Leslie Snider said she has never felt intimidated by the Web cams, and she even welcomes the service, seeing it as just another form of communication between staff members and parents, like written daily logs and conferences.

"It's difficult for parents to drop off their children at day care without knowing what is going on during the day," Pichler said. "You wouldn't believe how much stress this takes off them."

For more information on The Learning Curve: (480) 545-4852.

Reach the reporter at michelle.woo@arizonarepublic.com or (602) 444-7941.

[Correction: Despite the information reported in this article, WatchMeGrow's product has never been installed at The Learning Curve Child Center. WatchMeGrow publishes articles as they are written.]