Why are nurseries so filthy?

[olyaro]

Over the past year, I’ve visited many local nurseries — not fewer than eight — all of which had excellent reviews and even Ofsted Outstanding ratings. However, the one thing they all had in common was how shockingly unclean they were. Each time I visited, I felt uncomfortable even touching anything. The floors and surfaces didn’t look properly cleaned, there was often an unpleasant smell, and dirty clothes were piled up in corners.

What surprised me most is that in every nursery, parents and visitors are allowed to walk in with outdoor shoes, which clearly contributes to the dirt and unhygienic environment.
I’ve given this some thought, and I believe the problem stems from two main things:

1. The lack of a no-shoes policy indoors
2. The absence of a dedicated cleaner during the day

For comparison, my sister's daughter attends a nursery in another country — it’s spotless.(it's much cheaper than random nursery in the UK) There, a cleaner is employed throughout the day and the environment is kept clean and fresh.

It makes me wonder: Why isn’t there a rule or minimum hygiene requirement in UK nurseries that includes a dedicated cleaner on duty? Of course, I understand this would increase costs, but I believe proper hygiene should be non-negotiable where young children are concerned. I doubt these nurseries are ever deep-cleaned properly, and it’s no surprise that children constantly get sick. Poor hygiene seems to be a major contributor.
As a side note, I myself went to a nursery that was immaculately clean, and I’ve always had good immunity and rarely get sick. So I find it hard to believe that exposing children to unsanitary environments somehow "strengthens their immunity." In my view, it just makes them ill.

The U.K. does not have a shoes off indoors culture in general.

there are some nurseries (and I think maybe some schools) that do it but ofsted like free flow between inside and outside and that’s hard to make work if kids have to change their shoes.

nurseries in other countries are also often substantially subsidised by the state. The price a parent pays is not necessarily the cost of provision.

I had to view 3 nurseries to find a clean one last year but they do exist.

Mine went to an outdoor nursery: wall to wall mud in January! We used to hose them down before removing the big ‘suits’ to get in the car. By March, the suits could stand up by themselves…

Money.

Firstly, good ofsted ratings are irrelevant.

Cleaners cost money. Getting the staff to do it would mean the staff having time not looking after the children and that doesn't happen because there's not enough money to have 'free' staff.
No shoes indoors would involve a member of staff spending hours each day helping with outdoor shoes and slippers.
Increasing costs isn't possible because the government has capped their income via funding.

Because children are disgusting little creatures, ime. (Said with affection)

OP I agree with you!
I looked around for a while to find one for my little one. We are a shoes off house and my child knows to do that at home.
at nursery there were no shoes allowed in the baby room (this was important to me as my baby was crawling at the time). But shoes are allowed in the next room up.
but this nursery didn’t have that awful smell - I know exactly the one you mean and agree with everything you’re saying!

You remember the cleanliness of your own nursery? That is really unlikely are rose tinted glasses at play?

I went to nursery when I was 3 to 6 years old, so yeah, I do remember — and so do my parents.

I am laughing at the thought of having to take all the children’s shoes off and on as they came in and out of the garden. They probably need to keep their shoes on inside too as there may be paint, toys etc on the floor.

In nurseries abroad you either have to take your shoes off of wait outside. There are cleaners in each nursery not sure about every nursery in uk. In nurseries abroad children sleep in beds here they sleep on the floor on dirty mattresses

I've worked in UK nurseries and nurseries in Finland. In UK nurseries, the staff are expected to do the 'daily cleaning' which means they have to choose to look after the children or clean, so the cleaning will often have to be done properly at the beginning or end of each 'shift'
There's normally no 'shoes off' policy as its not something the nurseries want to do and it's time consuming swapping slippers and shoes over. Children will leave nursery typically by age 4.
In Finland, everyone takes their shoes off including teachers, there are 'shoe lockers' and the children are taught to put their shoes in the cubby holes. They all bring slip on shoes (almost like ballet slippers) Baby nurseries are separate from older children (parental leave is also a year)
Children don't leave until they are 6, so the older children it's more like the 'early years' part of our primary schools. The assistant teacher or helper or student teacher (the training is longer for this role) will often double as the daytime cleaner as they can earn extra by doing this.

Having cleaned a nursery for several years.. leadership set the tone. There shouldn’t be anything building up in corners because everything should have its place. However, nursery staff are often young, under-paid and under-valued. There is little incentive for them to operate the rooms enthusiastically. Lack of supervision also means toddlers can draw on walls, grind playdough into carpets without being redirected.
Also, owners are not prepared to pay for the necessary hours of cleaning to get it looking really good. And cleaners can be tired, lazy, lacksidaisical unless leadership is good at nurturing them too.

Remember we all had to bring slippers and wear them indoors at primary school. It didn't last long. I think its way too much hassle and fuss for children to keep changing their shoes. It is also incompatible with free flow. Even getting older children to take off and put shoes back on for PE is very time consuming.

In european countries children have to bring in slippers to wear inside the nursery only. The thing with not taking shoes off when inside is that a lot of children get sick from touching the floor and their licking or sucking their fingers

I agree with you, I want to nursery in Germany when my parents went there for a work related trip and the nursery was very clean.

I had to take my shoes off and wear plimsolls as indoor shoes. I also had to take my own colouring pencils, books, craft materials and even paints and brushes : o

However, I prefer UK nurseries...the germs are better for immunity : p

Definitely not the ones in my area. My DS goes to a nursery and it’s very clean. We looked round a few and they were all very clean. I wouldn’t send my DCs to a dirty one.

This is my main reason for choosing a childminder for my kids. My childminders house is spotless.

Every nursery I've looked at has been filthy... And every parent with a child in nursery has had so many illnesses. My kids have had none, despite going to childcare since 12 months.

Also studies show it's not good to "build up their immunity" so young. If you have ear infections in the first three years of life, for example, studies show you are likely to have a weakness there and get more ear infections throughout a lifetime. If you don't get an ear infection until you're age five or older, you're significantly less likely to have repeat infections. So the building up immunity argument isn't backed by research - in fact it's better for kids to get ill less, particularly under age 5 when everything is developing

Not the case for my DC's nursery, it is lovely and clean. The baby room doesn't allow outdoor shoes but the other rooms do.

Mine have started nursery at 3 months and have had the usual cold/sniffles but nothing major so definitely not ill all of the time either.

I'm not in the UK and my children went to a bog standard state nursery for babies and toddlers (0-3) and we HAD to put shoe covers over our shoes in the entrance area before entering the main nursery area.

I don't think my kids nursery was the cleanest, but I do remember adults had to take shoes off when we visited.

They only went 2 days a week so I didn't mind too much.

I never noticed how clean or not either of the nurseries we used were. They looked fine. It wasn't something I was particularly looking out for

Sorry to hear this OP - my own children’s nurseries were spotless - but wait til you see how filthy primary schools are. Absolutely rank. And that’s speaking as a teacher. It’s hard to get cleaners and even if you can, state schools don’t have the money to pay them to do the necessary hours. Some school staff are even having to clean on INSET days.

I've worked in shoes-off nurseries and they're still filthy.

It just comes down to money - the owners don't want to pay for a cleaner so staff are expected to do a quick clean at the end of the day while still supervising the kids.

It's only ever a surface clean and toys only get properly cleaned if there's a bad outbreak.

Schools are also filthy for the same reason - minimal cleaning hours budgetted for.
Classroom tables are almost never cleaned unless the teacher does it themselves.

The better nursery we used had free-flow play inside and outside, so swapping shoes would have been impractical.

My DD2 loved the outdoor area, particularly the mud kitchen. She used to come home looking like she'd been down a mine or up a chimney. Given that she was allowed back inside, I can't see how they could have kept the place spotless. She did seem to be unusual in quite how filthy she was at home time.

The first nursery we used would get the children changed into clean clothes for home time. I always thought that was pointless.