MEMPHIS, Tenn. — It’s tough to look at the surveillance video. A worker at Nurturing Young Minds Day Care appears to shake little, William Durden Jr. before grabbing him by the arm.
William Durden said he watched the video after his son came home with burn marks on his face.
The Department of Children’s Services is investigating and so are child care regulators at the Department of Human Services.
Nurturing Minds owner Senese Duhart told WREG, “We just made the necessary changes that we needed to in terms of the personnel.”
The day care confirmed a worker’s termination and Director Stephanie Howard said the facility does its part with background checks.
“We’re sorry everything happened. We are a three star center, we never had anything of this nature to happen before,” she said.
While the owner and director reinforced that they’re investigating the situation, WREG found it’s another glaring example of how three star day cares don’t always equate to quality care.
A quick check of the day care’s compliance history online shows they fired a worker who thumped a child on the ear.
The director reported the incident to DHS in November 2016. Months before, there were supervision violations, as well as a violation for problems with attendance logs.
WREG also confirmed Nurturing Young Minds was hit with a $1,000 civil penalty in 2015 for transportation violations and that’s not online.
The News Channel 3 Investigators showed the video to State Representative Antonio Parkinson.
He said, “It is something that concerns me and it’s something that warrants a review.”
Parkinson said he’s willing to talk to DHS leaders about a possible change.
“If the public is basing their faith or their confidence in, especially a state generated grading system, then as a state, we need to make sure that it’s correct and it’s accurate.”
In December of 2015, workers at Discovery Zone Learning Center in Cordova left a child inside the facility after closing for the day.
It was a three star rated center that also had a pattern of previous violations.
WREG has probed day care violations for a number of years and spoken with DHS about its star ratings system.
