St. Luke's Hopital teaching youth to be Smart Sitters

CEDAR RAPIDS – Toy dolls, teddy bears and even a purple gorilla dotted the floor of the classroom at St. Luke's Hospital.

Placed on blankets, the toys were diapered and swaddled by future babysitters.

“We set up a lot of scenarios to see how they respond to them,” says Andi Quinn, a maternal/child nurse educator at St. Luke's.

Quinn oversees St. Luke's Smart Sitter class, which is designed to equip future sitters with the information they need to take on babysitting with experience and confidence. Rather than learn on the fly, these 25 boys and girls are giving up six hours of their summer vacation to learn about child development, safe play, child CPR, first aid and basic child care, which includes diapering and bottles.

The experience, Quinn says, is what will set these sitters apart from others.

“For many kids, this is going to be their first job,” Quinn says. “We want them to be prepared. We want parents to know that they can trust their babysitter, that they've had some training and are prepared to be the substitute parent.”

Offered to Eastern Iowa youth for more than 25 years, the program has trained thousands of sitters in Eastern Iowa – including Kylie Harrelson's cousins. Now that she's 12, Kylie says it's her turn.

“I really like kids and I've always wanted to babysit,” she says.

Kathleen Francois, 10, has more of a personal interest in the class.

“My mom is going to have a new baby in September,” Kathleen says. “I just decided to look for classes that would help me with newborns and infants, and I found this.”

Open to participants ages 10 and up, several Smart Sitters classes are held throughout the year, including four sessions during summer vacation, one during winter break and two during spring break. Quinn says the potential babysitters receive a lot of information that time, but that it's presented in a way that keeps it from being overwhelming.

“We want baby-sitting to be a fun experience. We don't want them to be stressed out,” she says, adding that the course in continuously reviewed so that the most current information is shared with participants.

“Our curriculum is based on the latest information from the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the CDC,” Quinn says. “We tell them that the parents are going to be impressed because they are current.”

Smart Sitter is available free of charge. Participants have the option of paying $7 for a Smart Sitter tote bag and $3 for a CPR booklet.

The Smart Sitter classes for the remaining summer sessions are full, but a class will be offered on Dec. 27. To register, visit https://www.stlukescr.org/classes-and-events.aspx.

Kirkwood Community College also offers a babysitting class. At this time, the August, September and October classes have openings. The fee is $29.

Mercy Medical Center of Cedar Rapids is in the process of revamping its Super Sitters program.