Amber M Zennaiter

I attribute my success to being humble, kind, and compassionate. In this field, you have to understand that you cannot be judgmental. You have to understand that kids come from all different places, and a lot of times some of these parents don't have a choice but to leave their kids for 11 hours a day because they have to work to pay bills. Sometimes when they get done with work, they're tired, so they go home and it's literally feeding them and putting them to bed - they don't get to spend time with their children. That's where we come in, and we provide the love, the affection, the attention that the kids need to grow and develop. Instead of judging the parent, we have to understand that that parent really doesn't have a choice. I pride myself on understanding that every parent has a story, every child has a story, and they come from different backgrounds. We have to just love that child as if they're just here to have fun.

The best career advice I've ever received is to always stand on your faith and to never give up, especially when everything is stacked against you. When you feel like you're up against the wall and you can't go no further, there's always a little bit more that you can dig deeper to overcome it. I've learned that God will give you the toughest battles when He's about to elevate you, and you just have to find just that little piece that'll push you over.

The advice I give to anybody is that childcare is not for everyone. I'd rather you tell me that it's not for you than to have something happen to a child. Also, you're not going to become a millionaire financially, but you will become a millionaire in memories and moments. A lot of kids run around here calling me Mommy and want to come home with me. When I come in in the morning, I have kids saying they miss me so much, and they literally saw me 8 hours ago. That means more to me than the paycheck I get. A lot of times the work that I do - working 11, 12-hour days, sometimes working when I go home, sometimes working on weekends - doesn't amount to what my paycheck is. But these kids feel it. They keep me going. I can wake up every morning and say I love my job, and it's not a burden for me to get up and go to work. When you can say you love your job and you get up and go, it's really not a job. Doing something that you love, it's not a job to you.

Some of the biggest challenges we're going through right now are financial hardships. The state is really struggling with the finances for childcare. Parents are struggling to be able to afford childcare and quality childcare, and we're being told we have to do so many things and abide by so many standards and qualifications that it puts a financial burden on us. Parents can't afford it unless they get subsidy help, and then there's a waiting list. It's been a really hard struggle. We started a scholarship fund to try to help parents on our own outside of the state, but even that is hard - it's difficult to get donations and collaborations with businesses to help us fund these things. Our biggest difficulty is keeping quality staff because they have to pay their bills, but we're trying to keep quality staff while also keeping parents happy and keeping our prices low so they can work but know their children are taken care of.

The most important values to me are putting God first and understanding that I'm never above anyone, no matter what my title is. I tell my staff all the time that I will never ask them to do anything that I wouldn't do, whether it's changing a diaper or cleaning a bathroom. If I ask them to do it, I would do it too. So I'm never above them, even though I hold the director title. It does not mean that I won't get in a classroom and do it. I have a lot of parents who come in and tell me they've gone to other centers and never seen the director, or the director's always in the office. They say, 'You're always in the classroom, we always see your face, we always know where you're at. You're answering messages on weekends and at night.' And I'm like, that's what I'm supposed to do, right? Sometimes I'm confused because I've never been in these other centers, and they're telling me that other centers don't do that.