Family Magazine reports that 76% of middle school age youth are babysitting either family members or other’s children. According to a new American Red Cross poll, parents say that good babysitters are hard to find, and they want to entrust their children to babysitters trained in first aid, CPR and childcare skills. Childcare training provides life skills in parenting. Babysitting is often a youth’s first gainful employment experience. The Henderson County Cooperative Extension Service 4-H and FCS agents offered a two-day babysitting clinic the first two days of summer break for middle school and high school students. A recruitment flyer was shared across Facebook and monthly newsletters. The FCS and 4-H agent received $2500 from the University of Kentucky School of Human Environmental Sciences Family and Consumer Sciences Extension Mini Grant Program for the “Babysitting” program.  This allowed us to pay for the CPR/First Aid training along with backpacks, station material, food sampling, and activities for the kids.  

Twenty-four female youth in grades 7th-11th learned about child development and milestones, toys and activities for children, basic care of infants, toddlers and children, and the business basics of being a self-employed babysitter. Youth were also Red Cross certified in first aid and CPR by hospital professionals. 

Evaluation included written pre-tests and post-tests and daily discussions on lessons from the previous day. A comparison of the pre-post test scores showed an overall average increase of 7% in scores indicating that knowledge was gained by participants during the clinic. On the post self-assessment, at least ninety percent of the participants indicated an increase of the following skills: ability to take on more responsibility, the ability to communicate in front of a group, solve problems or conflicts better, achieving individually set goals, use of safety practices, participating in more community service, and feeling more confident in caring for infants, toddlers, and preschoolers. Participants also shared that they had developed the following important skills and that they will definitely use them or already have in between the two-day clinic: CPR, first aid, handling emergencies, healthy snacks and recipes, diaper changing, burping, bottle feeding, more playtime activities, hand washing, and more confidence in nap time. Fifty percent of participants reassessed the hourly wage they were charging prior to the babysitting clinic and chose to raise their rates an average of $4.00 per hour.

Since starting and completing the 4-H babysitting clinic, youth attending reported on their assessment that overall, twenty-one babysitting jobs had been secured by participants combined.