After an investigation found a teacher was physically abusing toddlers at a now-closed Burlington childcare center, parents want the state to ban the owner, who runs another program in Essex, from the field.
In a statement to Seven Days, two dozen parents whose children attended the Burlington Frog & Toad Child Care and Learning Center said that they believe its owner, Tiffany Corbett, was warned about the teacher’s “patterns of abusive behavior” and failed to report it to the state. Not fulfilling her responsibility as a “mandated reporter” — a person required by law to report reasonable suspicions of abuse — should disqualify her from running her other Frog & Toad center in Essex, they said.
“Collectively, we call on the state to intervene and terminate [Corbett’s] ability to own or control a child care facility in any way,” the parents wrote. “Tiffany must take responsibility for her failures to protect the children from a dangerous child abuser she employed, and whose abuse she was aware of or should have been aware of.”
The Burlington center shuttered abruptly on March 20. After the closure, state regulators reviewed records, including site visits and incident reports, from the Essex location and found no evidence that would support closing it, according to Janet McLaughlin, deputy commissioner of the Department for Children and Families’ Child Development Division.
“We have not received any complaints or concerns from families or staff about that location in the last three years,” McLaughlin wrote in an email to Seven Days.
Corbett did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Seven Days previously reported that Corbett made the decision to close the Burlington center amid two investigations, one by state regulators and one by police, into allegations that a former teacher physically abused children. The criminal investigation is still pending.
The state’s Department for Children and Families, meanwhile, has finished its investigation and released its nine-page report last week. Regulators reviewed video footage of the center’s indoor and outdoor spaces and found violations that corroborate details shared with Seven Days by a teacher who was fired on February 7 and subsequently called DCF’s child abuse hotline.
The majority of the violations pertain to a teacher, identified as Staff X in the report. Seven Days is not naming the teacher due to the pending criminal investigation.
Classroom video footage from the “toddler room,” where children ranged in age from 18 to 36 months, showed Staff X “regularly yelling at children;” “aggressively” moving or pushing children; taking food and toys away from children as punishment; grabbing a child’s arms and tossing them backwards three feet; and hitting a child on the head with diapers, among other instances of abuse. Video also captured Staff X restraining a child for six minutes with the child’s head in between his legs, while the child tried to escape.
Outdoor video captured Staff X throwing a child into a hard-packed snowbank as two other staff members looked on. After the incident, the child lay motionless for several minutes and remained “lethargic” for the rest of the day. An injury report sent to the child’s parents later that day said a bump on the child’s chin was from falling in the gymnasium.
The DCF report states that the site director of the Burlington program, who is related to Staff X and also supervised him, told investigators she would not answer any questions about him.
The report also said that Corbett, Frog & Toad’s owner and executive director, was aware of an allegation by a former employee that Staff X threw a child into a snowbank but “did not believe the person” and did not feel the need to look into it.
Seven Days reviewed a February 7 email from that former employee to Corbett. It says, in part, “help me understand why [Staff X] continues to still yell at those kids every day” and asks why “it’s OK for [Staff X] to also put his hands on the kids.” The email advises Corbett to “watch the camera” to see Staff X picking up children and throwing them face first into a snowbank.
“The significant number of incidents observed through this video footage would indicate that these interactions, even if not all observed, gives pause to how they all would occur without being noticed,” the DCF report states.
Parents are wondering the same thing.
Several whose children were in the Burlington center’s toddler room said they have been contacted by a victim’s advocate from the Chittenden County State’s Attorney’s Office. They said they are angry at the staff member who perpetrated the abuse as well as with the system that allowed it to happen.
One father, whose child was a victim, said it’s frustrating that those he believes enabled the abuse “are moving on with no consequences.”
“This is not vindictive,” said another father whose toddler was abused. “[Tiffany] needs to relinquish ownership and management, and the state should never allow her to be involved with children in any way ever again.”
Parents also questioned why, when a childcare program closes, any records of its violations are removed from the state’s Bright Futures Child Care Information System, a searchable public database that contains regulatory history for Vermont childcare programs.
The state agrees with the critique, according to McLaughlin, the DCF deputy commissioner. The agency cannot make the change in its current database, she said, but is in the process of selecting a vendor to replace the Bright Futures system.
Following the closure and release of the DCF report, Burlington Frog & Toad parents have been in touch with parents from the Essex center. Several who spoke with Seven Days said they have been satisfied with the care at the Essex center but are disturbed by the findings in Burlington and believe Corbett should step away.
Andrew Viens said he faces a “moral dilemma” in deciding whether to keep his child there. He believes that what happened at the Burlington center shows “a high level of administrative incompetence,” and he feels conflicted about “putting money in the pocket” of someone who may have allowed abuse to happen.
Viens was surprised the state would allow a person who closes a childcare program amid abuse allegations to be an active participant in running another program. Still, he feels stuck given the lack of childcare options.
Nicole Schubert, whose child also attends the Essex center, praised the kind, caring and trustworthy teachers and site director there. But, she said, paying Corbett each week “makes me sick to my stomach.” Reading the state’s report, she said, it was “overwhelmingly apparent” to her that others witnessed or knew about the abuse and didn’t report it.
Jenn Reges, a clinical social worker whose child attends the Essex center, highlighted the severity of DCF’s findings, noting that the “multiple forms of repeated abuse” detailed in the state report mean that young children experienced developmental trauma that could potentially have long-lasting effects.
Reges said she was struck that other staff members didn’t intervene when they witnessed the abuse, which she called “incredibly concerning, disappointing and downright shocking.”
Some Essex parents said they were not reassured by a March 25 email from Corbett in which she explained her decision to close the Burlington center and outlined “enhanced protocols” for the Essex one, including additional training for staff and more video cameras in the center.
In the email, Corbett also defended herself.
“I have conducted myself openly, honestly, and cooperatively with the [Child Development Division] through every licensing visit at each location over two decades, and through the entirety of this current investigation,” Corbett wrote. “That the [Child Development Division] has confirmed that they are not seeking the closure of our Essex location also indicates that I have not been identified as a contributor to the concerns at the Burlington location.”
Schubert, who is looking for a different program for her child, said she’d like to see Corbett step down and transfer Frog & Toad ownership to her employees.
That’s what some of the Burlington parents also believe should happen.
LeeAnn Tiffault, whose preschooler attended the Burlington center, acknowledged that closing the Essex center would disrupt the lives of families who rely on it. She believes Corbett should sell the business or step away to “maintain continuity for families while also ensuring the program is set up to meet the standards children deserve.”
Despite the recent upheaval, Tiffault and other Burlington parents recently got some good news.
ONE Arts, a nonprofit that runs five childcare programs in Vermont, recently opened a new classroom in one of its Queen City centers to accommodate children from the shuttered Frog & Toad. In recent weeks, around 20 families have enrolled their children in the program, which is housed in the former Sara Holbrook Community Center on North Avenue.
Bobby Riley, ONE Arts’ director of education, said staff have stepped up to get the new space ready and support former Frog & Toad parents, who are “stressed out and unsettled.” A large part of the work, Riley said, is helping those families rebuild their trust in the childcare system.
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