At Barefoot Village, we recognise the role of parenting as the single most important in society and we seek to amplify this status through education, support, innovative solutions and connection. We foster and support connection within families through baby massage, baby yoga and developmental play workshops and connection between families, community and businesses through the Creche Project. This is the reason that we have decided to create The Creche Project, as a platform to advocate for the rights of families to access self-fulfilment through community engagement, workplace participation and quality education.

“I have created The Creche Project as I witness the needs of parents to fulfil their spiritual, social, emotional, financial and physical needs outside of their caring role. We seek to amplify the role of parenting to the status it deserves, and offer services and projects that support this plight. As a parent, business owner and educator, this project is close to my heart and I believe that it is a contemporary solution to the current mental health, economic and child care crisis that Australia faces. Parental mental health, is infant mental health, is the whole of societies mental health. This is everyones business.” Hollie, founder, visionary and Australian mother

Empowering families to fulfil their social, emotional, spiritual, physical and financial needs in order to thrive.

• Connecting families, community and business
• Be the change that you wish to see in the world- working towards a more inclusive and person-centred world
• The mental health of parent is inextricably linked to the mental health of their children- this is the future of society. It affects everyone
• We see you. We hear you. You are valid
• Respect for all individuals

We are a Creche Consultancy in the start-up phase, aspiring to provide a comprehensive service to businesses to create a bespoke developmental play Creche that meets the needs of the business, their clients and employees.

We offer consultancy from inception to delivery relating to spacial and service requirements, planning and projection including in-house research to determine consumer needs and staffing requirements, fit-out delivery and set-up, trained staff, flexible funding options and we work with all budgets.

WHO IS THIS PROJECT FOR?

BUSINESSES

This service suits a wide range of businesses that are seeking to increase in-person attendance to their services (for example fitness studio’s, co-working hubs, health clinics, shopping centres) or businesses that wish to offer a solution to childcare shortages, effectively increasing female participation in the labour force, staff satisfaction and productivity, a reduction in absenteeism, increased loyalty, higher rates of return to work after maternity leave and a greater sense of work-life balance.

Through The Creche Project you have an opportunity to pivot your business following the Pandemic and support your clients and employees through an innovative and family-centred initiative. By providing a safe space, you are offering your people an incentive to ‘come back’, offering a solution to their problems while increasing revenue and productivity. It’s a Win-Win-Win!

FAMILIES

As Our Mission states… we seek to empower families to fulfil their social, emotional, cognitive, physical, spiritual and financial needs in order to thrive. This means the entire family! Our developmental play creche’s offer children an opportunity to explore, connect and expand. Developmental play is an education approach that ensures children have the fundamentals in place for their cognitive, physical, social and emotional growth. This approach places the child as the expert in their learning. The educator is a facilitator, who is provided with ample support and development opportunities to establish and build on a connected and positive child-educator relationship, create and maintain a dynamic and stimulating environment and foster the important social relationships within the Creche environment.

The Covid-19 Pandemic has affected many lives, with lockdowns, forced isolation and uncertainty causing financial and emotional strains on families. The Creche Project offers an opportunity, post-lockdown, for parents to enter back into the community, take care of their emotional, mental, physical and mental health with the assurance that their children are receiving low-cost, yet highly attuned care, in a developmental play space with educators who are passionate, informed and have high levels of job satisfaction.

EDUCATORS

We recognise that the educator is the single most important determinant in the successful outcome of the learning environment. This is why we seek to uplift educators by providing support, education, above-award wages and offer security within their roles. The current child care industry in in crisis and at Barefoot Village we offer ample opportunity for professional development, focussing on self-care and mentoring to ensure that our educators are engaged, supported and have a high level of job satisfaction.

This is for the educators who want to be the change they wish to see in the Industry.

A GRASS-ROOTS SOLUTION TO AUSTRALIA’S CHILD CARE AND MENTAL HEALTH CRISIS, PROVIDING OPPORTUNITIES FOR PRIMARY CAREGIVERS TO ENTER INTO THE WORKFORCE AND QUALITY CARE FOR CHILDREN

The Creche Project is an innovative, family and community-centred solution to several key issues that face Australian families and businesses following the Covid-19 Pandemic.

One Australian sector that has been affected severely by the Pandemic, is that of the Child Care Industry. A recent survey (United Workers Union, 2021) of over 3400 child care educators, revealed that an astonishing 74% of educators were intending to leave the sector within the next 3 years, and 26% of these educators planned to leave within the year. This, combined with a drop of 73% in recruitment since 2000 (despite an enrolment increase of 45%) and the universal experience of centres’ reporting ‘great difficulties’ in retaining staff, we are faced with a serious crisis in childcare. The report went on to quote the concerns of child care educations around Australia relating to low-pay, feeling undervalued, understaffing- resulting in high stress levels, concerns for children’s safety, emotional and mental health and the priority of money over education. The industry is at “breaking-point”, and the high turnover of staff is “damaging for children and educators”.

The Pandemic is also affecting families at an unprecedented rate. Families are required to work from home, whilst maintaining their child care duties. According to current research (Cameron, Joyce, Delaquis, Reynolds, Protudjer & Roos, 2021), mothers with children aged 0-8 are facing significantly increased rates of anxiety and depression. Exposure to maternal anxiety and depression are linked with cognitive, emotional and motor delays and lower academic performance. Maternal anxiety in mothers of children up to 4 years of age are particularly vulnerable to financial stress. Recent research from the Grattan Institute (2021) argues that adequate childcare solutions could be a key driver of post-Covid economic recovery. Women have been disproportionately impacted by social distance measures, reducing their ability to engage in the workforce and take respite from their caring duties.The Creche Project offers hope through compassionate care, education and opportunity to these families to begin to rebuild their capacity financially and through community engagement for respite and self-care.

Further to this, the ABS (2019) state that primary parental leave is the type of leave most likely to affect people’s career trajectories which sheds light  on the ever present pay gap of 14% between men and women, and dire concerns relating to superannuation for women of retirement-aged. This makes a smatter of sense should mothers choose to remain the primary care giver following maternity leave, however the ABS further report that the most common reason that women were unavailable to work or increase their working hours was due to caring for children, stating the most important incentive for women was access to a childcare place. This offers businesses with unique insight and ample opportunity to accomodate families with flexible and innovative solutions to their barriers for fulfilment.

The Creche Project also provides businesses with a chance to pivot current and previous working arrangements through creativity. Advocating for company funded (or at least partially) we believe that co-working hubs with creche facilities offer a local solution, reducing travel time, workplace stress and increasing work-life balance.

THE CRECHE PROJECT GIVES YOU OPTIONS

• To look after your mental and physical health
• To seek fulfilment financially, emotionally and spiritually
• To increase workforce participation
• To increase attendance to your classes and services
• To increase access to community
• To increase opportunities to develop, explore and connect
• To increase maternal return to work following maternity leave
• To increase work-life balance, productivity and satisfaction
• To increase opportunities to engage in self-development
• To expand your business

The options are endless.

WHY IS THE CRECHE PROJECT UNIQUE?

PLACE-BASED APPROACH

We offer bespoke services that consider the budget and needs of your business, consumers and the community. Flexibility in these services offers you an ability to co-create your perfect space whether that be a school holiday pop-up creche or permanent creche and options for all budgets and staffing requirements.  This ensures that we are operating from our philosophy and mission to meet families where they are and offer solutions for all.

LOCAL AUTONOMY

We seek to involve the local community including the business and the individuals that will utilise the service to ensure that all decisions are made in the best interest of all parties

EDUCATORS

We recognise the importance of, and need to value our educators. They are the pillar of our services. We require our educators to have a minimum of a Certificate IV in Child care, or at least 5 years of working experience, along with a current and valid Working with Children and Police check. Further to this, we provide extensive professional development through the Educators Program which focusses on the latest research relating to child development; attachment science; brain science; developmental play; responsive, attuned and conscious education; developmental psychology and managing the play space. This ensures that our educators reflect Barefoot Villages philosophy in all interactions. We are with our educators every step of the way, promoting mental wellbeing and self-care through our wellness mentoring program.

HOLLIE McERLAIN

“As the founder and visionary of Barefoot Village and The Creche Project, I offer unique insight into the workings of the creche environment. I have worked with families for the last 10 years providing private education and care, and more recently in a creche environment. As a mother, I have also utilised creche extensively to fulfil my emotional, social, physical and financial needs. I have experienced first hand the challenges present when acting in the primary care giver role, a desire to work and an inability to access quality child care as well as personal and business ramifications from the Covid-19 Pandemic. I have engaged in study relating to child development, infant and maternal mental health, developmental play, holistic counselling and mediation therapy and have developed a framework of which to educate and support businesses to take the next step to uplift families.”

We would like to thank you so humbly for taking the time to make our dream a reality.

This is a revolution, a grass-roots solution to the Australian child care and mental health crisis.

I invite you to take the step, to be the change that you wish to see in the world.

From my family to yours,

Thank You