What's Adventure Time like at other Oakland schools?

My child is a student at Chabot Elementary in Oakland, and she has gone to Adventure Time's afterschool care for a few years now. This year, she is having a tough time at AT, and I'm wondering what AT is like at other schools in Oakland.

For comparison, I can tell you that at Chabot this year, I've noticed that I regularly see new faces supervising the kids on the yard (high employee turnover?), and there have been multiple occasions of many employees calling in sick at once, and the entire program has to adjust. My daughter often does not know the names of the caregivers at AT. I NEVER do, and they never have any idea who I am. In years past, there were a few stalwarts who seemed to know every kid by name, but this year, they're all gone. According to my daughter, AT consists of a 20-minute period where everyone has to sit still and stay absolutely silent while one person checks all the kids in (We are talking about a lot of kids - this is total misery for my daughter and her friends, who are really ready to run around and play and talk after the school day ends), followed by totally unstructured free play time. We are fans of free play time, but this year my daughter has had the experience of not connecting to the adults around her at all. There have been a few occasions where something happened that my daughter would ordinarily have gotten help from an adult with (conflicts with other kids, etc.), but she did not, because she doesn't feel comfortable turning to any of the adults at AT, because they are all basically strangers to her. 

I can't figure out if this state of affairs is just "normal" for AT, or if it is somehow unique to Chabot. If your child goes to one of the schools where AT runs your aftercare, can you share with me what it's like? (Or, frankly, if your kid is at Chabot and you are having a different experience or have any insight into what the heck is going on, I'd love to hear from you too.) Thanks, BPN.

Parent Replies

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hi - my child is in kindergarten at Kaiser and our Adventure Time experience has been great. The staffing is consistant (a little turn over), there are low staff to student ratios, most staff know me, and they all know my child. The staff seem pretty involved in leading activities for the kids both outside and inside.  Over all, I think that the Kaiser program is smaller, proportionally to the school size, than some other AT programs which helps with the good ratios and the connections b/t staff and students.

Kaiser AT parent

My kids go to AT at kaiser and they love it. It is very different from how you describe chabot.