Pat's Schoolhouse
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if the info shared by the teacher is truthful, there is nothing to cover up
it is good to alert the parents and the school should be mindful that \"paper cannot wrap fire\".
as an outsider, it is troubling to note :
1. The school is now owned by Knowledge Universe, a US company. Pat Koh has sold her interest and pocketed the money. Where is her commitment ? Who is accountable to who ? Where is the Org Chart of the school ? \"Our team\" consists only of one Patricia Koh. There is no other management members ?
2. If you surf the websites of KU and PSH, there is no way you could contact anyone directly via email except http://www.patschoolhouse.com/contact-us. Who is the guarantee that such web-form filling will be read ? By who ? They don't even have a whistle-blower email (which is a popular thing among US companies)
http://www.kueducation.com/
http://www.patschoolhouse.com -
verykiasu2010:
If happychildren is truly a teacher at PSH and sharing true information, then it is good for parents to know. However, we must be mindful that nobody can verify the status of people posting on forum and not every post is genuine.if the info shared by the teacher is truthful, there is nothing to cover up
it is good to alert the parents and the school should be mindful that \"paper cannot wrap fire\".
Please see below a similar post by a \"pats school house teacher\" on todayonline comments.
http://www.todayonline.com/Singapore/EDC110514-0000296/Food-poisoning-hits-another-pre-school-centre
I personally have my doubts about this post. Reasons? An average PSH teacher should be able to write better. My personal experience with the teachers indicate that they are not such a downtrodden submissive bunch who will take anything from the management. More importantly, the kids of some of the teachers or the principal are often in the same school eating the same food. Why would they suffer in silence and allow their own kids to eat the food from such a vendor? I know for a fact that principal and teacher feedback was sought regarding food quality or taste. -
verykiasu2010:
I have used the [email protected] email and received a direct personal email from Patricia Koh herself. I was very surprised. And subsequently I have written to her on another unrelated matter and received a prompt reply from her. I have found Patricia Koh to be even more responsive on email than the school principal!2. If you surf the websites of KU and PSH, there is no way you could contact anyone directly via email except http://www.patschoolhouse.com/contact-us. Who is the guarantee that such web-form filling will be read ? By who ? They don't even have a whistle-blower email (which is a popular thing among US companies)
Patricia Koh's mobile is also given out to parents in the latest school letter pasted on the communication book regarding this food poisoning incident. As a parent, I have not found it difficult to get in touch with management if that is a concern.
If any of us had found a problem with Mum's Kitchen's food prior to this incident, I don't think there is any difficulty getting this through to Patricia Koh herself. It is not in Knowledge Universe or Patricia Koh's financial interest to risk PSH's business reputation by continuing to use a questionable caterer which includes non food items in the food. The question is more of - whether management could have selected a better caterer or supervised Mum's Kitchen better or whether making more effort in having inhouse cooked food would have been a better decision. -
empressplace:
An average PSH teacher should be able to write better ? Really ? with such rapid expansion, I am doubtful, when every other pre-school is screaming short of talent
If happychildren is truly a teacher at PSH and sharing true information, then it is good for parents to know. However, we must be mindful that nobody can verify the status of people posting on forum and not every post is genuine.verykiasu2010:
if the info shared by the teacher is truthful, there is nothing to cover up
it is good to alert the parents and the school should be mindful that \"paper cannot wrap fire\".
Please see below a similar post by a \"pats school house teacher\" on todayonline comments.
http://www.todayonline.com/Singapore/EDC110514-0000296/Food-poisoning-hits-another-pre-school-centre
I personally have my doubts about this post. Reasons? An average PSH teacher should be able to write better. My personal experience with the teachers indicate that they are not such a downtrodden submissive bunch who will take anything from the management. More importantly, the kids of some of the teachers or the principal are often in the same school eating the same food. Why would they suffer in silence and allow their own kids to eat the food from such a vendor? I know for a fact that principal and teacher feedback was sought regarding food quality or taste. -
empressplace:
Thanks for sharing this.
I have used the [email protected] email and received a direct personal email from Patricia Koh herself. I was very surprised. And subsequently I have written to her on another unrelated matter and received a prompt reply from her. I have found Patricia Koh to be even more responsive on email than the school principal!verykiasu2010:
2. If you surf the websites of KU and PSH, there is no way you could contact anyone directly via email except http://www.patschoolhouse.com/contact-us. Who is the guarantee that such web-form filling will be read ? By who ? They don't even have a whistle-blower email (which is a popular thing among US companies)
Patricia Koh's mobile is also given out to parents in the latest school letter pasted on the communication book regarding this food poisoning incident. As a parent, I have not found it difficult to get in touch with management if that is a concern.
If any of us had found a problem with Mum's Kitchen's food prior to this incident, I don't think there is any difficulty getting this through to Patricia Koh herself. It is not in Knowledge Universe or Patricia Koh's financial interest to risk PSH's business reputation by continuing to use a questionable caterer which includes non food items in the food. The question is more of - whether management could have selected a better caterer or supervised Mum's Kitchen better or whether making more effort in having inhouse cooked food would have been a better decision.
KU may not know what is happening at ground level. Pat's financial interest ? ahem, I shall not say anymore, because I do not want to be accused of making suspicious remarks. Thanks again for sharing your experience.
Usually when the founder of a successful business has sold out, the tendency is the increasing lack of attention to the business by the ex-owner who is tasked to remain to provide continuity to the business, willingly or unwillingly, due to overarching financial interest of the new owner who paid for it.
I am NOT implying anything about PSH. Just my observation having being involved in many M&A over the last few decades. Everytime we read about such M&A touting synergy, economy of scale etc .... we have doubts. And American pre-school is very different from Singapore pre-school. Investor's financial interest will be the sole yardstick to measure how good was the deal entered into. Vendor would be under extreme pressure to ensure all the financial kpi are met, and the demands on Vendor will be very unforgiving. Between meeting those financial kpi in black and white and the perception of quality in catering, it will be obvious which is easier to give way
Once again, just some common market place observation. Not implying anything about PSH. -
verykiasu2010:
Yes, the average based on those I have seen or heard from other PSH parents.
An average PSH teacher should be able to write better ? Really ? with such rapid expansion, I am doubtful, when every other pre-school is screaming short of talent
Julia Gabriel's teachers are also supposedly quite good...perhaps even better. -
Hi Verykiasu2010
Your concerns on the general profit centredness of an investor is well noted. However as parents, we are only interested in the end result - whether our kids are happy, learning and growing well. To the extent that KU/Pat’s Schoolhouse and Mrs Patricia Koh could deliver that end result at a price that we could afford, that is all that matters and in that sense, our interests are aligned. The financial arrangements behind the scenes are none of our business. If PSH were to pursue profit without delivering the desired end result, this would be an unwise and counterproductive strategy for their investment. However achieving the balance is no easy feat. As parents, we can only hope that Knowledge Universe is a smart investor that knows how to maximise profit for itself while continuing to deliver a quality product.
It is a fact of life that there is increased inflation in the last few years. Food is more and more expensive. Rental is expensive. Every business owner would have to deal with this issue and whether to pass on the costs to the consumer. It is a hard call whether you should increase price to maintain profit margin and risk losing customers or whether to cut corners in some areas. To PSH’s credit, I haven’t seen a significant price increase. The only way that PSH could continue to deliver good end results without increasing prices significantly is to improve efficiency in process and working with quality vendors.
If PSH were to pursue a higher price point and higher quality strategy, I would not be surprised that it would still attract or retain customers. -
Thank you, both vk2010 and empressplace for your input, I have been following the thread.
I went to Mum's Kitchen's website to check them out because I've not had experience with them personally and wondered whether the school made a wrong decision in hiring them.
Although I am disturbed by this food poisoning incident, and definitely prefer that my kids have freshly prepared in-house cooked food, I am trying to understand what is happening. We all hope such incidents won't ever happen again, and certainly hope it is not Pat Koh os KU's negligence or ignorance of teachers' feedback that resulted in this.
I must say that if this didn't happen, any person browsing the website would be impressed with Mum's Kitchen.
Take a look at this page:
http://www.mumskitchen.com.sg/home3.asp
I wonder if it's true, but it reads so long, the MNCs and stat boards, even SIA are amongst the corporate clients. I suppose can't fault those who choose Mum's kitchen, given the track record?
Learning Vision, The Children's Place and Pats are all considered good/ higher-end childcare centers too.
We need to find out exactly what went wrong at the caterer's end.
As for our kids, I'm happy that they are no longer having catered food. Hope though, that all the aunties have extra help hired and that the kitchens can cope cos the menu should not be compromised.
And yes, at my son's school, the teachers all eat the same food and the principal herself had grandkids in the same school, I know at least 1 other teacher whose kid also studies and eats there too.
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oh, ds2 just returned and there is this new letter in the comm book updating us all about the situation, plus a new menu as well.
does anyone need me to type it out? those who are not parents but concerned? -
To all concerned,
Firstly, allow me to send my best wishes for a speedy recovery especially to the children and families affected by this unfortunate food poisoning incident. We are truly sorry that it happened when it should never have. In the 23 years of operating our centres, we have never had an incident like this. A lot of you have posted your thoughts and opinions here on the subject and I hope to factually address as many of them as possible.
Kabalevsky: Not all of our centres are affected in this incident, though all 13 centres were catered from food served by Mum’s Kitchen up until this incident. 8 centres were unfortunately affected and as MOH and NEA are still conducting their investigations, we do not wish to speculate on the reason why some were affected and others aren’t. We did not serve the children the same food everyday – the menus were planned carefully and met guidelines set by the Health Promotion Board. Since the 12th of May, we have permanent arrangements in place to cook meals from our inhouse kitchen for the children and staff.
GTGT: Unfortunately, we do not have an official FaceBook page, but you can reach us via our site at http://www.patschoolhouse.com/resources/latest-news and use the contact form there to reach us with your concerns. Alternatively, if you would like to contact me directly, please visit http://www.patschoolhouse.com/resources/ask-pat or my site http://www.patriciakoh.com and I will respond to you directly.
lolmum:Thank you for your understanding on the issue. Moving forward, with our decision to revert to the previous practice of having food prepared by our inhouse cooks, parents can rest assured that we are, and will continue to practise due diligence in ensuring that the standards of hygiene and food practices meets stringent standards. I believe we are in a better position to ensure that the food is freshly prepared and our kitchens are clean. Our Centre Principals and our District Managers are very conscientious at upholding our high standards and in providing the best environment for our children to be in.
Popstar: I remember having a very nice meeting at Starbucks with you and having a long discussion about our plans moving forward. I believe you understood the rationale behind the move to from inhouse kitchen to central kitchen to outsource catering. I am sure at that point in time we spoke about the possibility of making a change if the catering did not meet up to our expectations. It is unfortunate that the incident happened. It was not something anyone wished would occur.In all our 23 years of operating our preschools, an incident like this has never happened before. Since 12th of May and going forward, our in-house cooks have and will continue to prepare meals for the children on a permanent basis. I hope you will continue to give me feedback and know that we have your child’s interest at heart.
omgmum:You have raised a few issues, so please allow me to get to them.
1.\tWe will not be using another caterer in the future. As mentioned, we will be using in-house cooks to prepare food for the children and staff. This will be on a permanent basis. As above, you can reach me at http://www.patschoolhouse.com/resources/ask-pat and I will respond to you as soon as I can.
2. I understand your concern on the timeliness of how information has been disseminated to the parents of the children affected. I assure you that keeping our parents in the loop is important to us, and will continue to do that to the best of our ability. Parents had received communications as to what had transpired via various follow-up circulars and communications. We had also posted updates on our website. We are indeed sorry if some parents have missed out on reading some of their emails since they were busy managing their children’s illness.
empressplace: You too raised some concerns and I hope that I will be able to answer them here.
1.\tI believe that the article mentioned that the food that was suspected to be contaminated was served on Tuesday, and the children were starting to miss classes the following day, Wednesday. It was clear to us by Thursday morning that this was a very serious case, and the principals/teachers of the affected centres started contacting parents immediately by the afternoon. The checks done by MCYS and MOH were conducted on Thursday, not before Tuesday as you mentioned.
The teacher you spoke to may not have known the full extent of this incident on Wednesday, as we ourselves were at the time still gathering and verifying the information.
As for a proper explanation to all the parents, we are in close contact with and are supporting MOH and MCYS who are conducting their investigations into what has happened. We will seek to update all parents as soon as possible.
Our children’s nutrition has and will always be a priority for us. Moving forward, we will be cooking the children’s meals in house, and will adhere to stringent hygiene and food practices.
2.\tWith regards to your comments about “being cheap” and “class sizes”, we can assure you that the decision to switch to catering was not a cost-driven one. We are also answerable to our parents and MCYS when we declare our teacher to children ratios and do not take our commitments and promises about this lightly. Please email me directly if you have specific information about this that led you to this conclusion and I will be very happy to address this with you further at http://www.patschoolhouse.com/resources/ask-pat. The total well-being and health of our children has always been, and continue to be our top priority. Our decision to expand to have new centres have always been to meet demands from parents, and we will not do this if we compromise on our standards and quality of care.
3. Although we had a British Chef, Mr Rittersmith, we had a team of District Managers and principals overseeing the operation of the Kitchen at Mount Emily. I was personally working with our Nutritionist from the Institute of Education to design a menu that was suited for our children and agreeable with Mr Rittersmith’s fancy ideas. Over time we improved on the menu and provided our children with very healthy meals which were also approved by the Health Promotion Board. Mr Rittersmith also worked with two more chefs who were then posted to out other kitchens at Katong and Jubilee. Personally I was also training the new assistant cooks (who are our current kitchen aunties) and gave them ideas on how food should be prepared and presented to children. All our kitchen staff were also sent to the WDA Food Hygiene Course. Some of them are still attached to our kitchen even after the move to catering as we needed them to prepare breakfast and tea for the children.
So, when we started to prepare lunches inhouse from 12th May, we were able to do that quickly. All we needed to do was to activate out procurement team to arrange for the food supplies to be ordered on time for each centre.In fact, we have been doing this from 1988 to 2010, so it is definitely not a problem to put things back together again.
4.\tI am saddened to hear of such an accusation made by happychildren. My relationship with my Principals and teachers over the last 23 years has always been one of respect, trust and professionalism. I would like happychildren to contact me directly as I do take her comment very seriously and will get to the bottom of this. Indeed I do hope this is spoken out of love for the children in her class and for her colleagues at her centre and not just because she has a grudge to bear. We have always pride ourselves to have the best working environment for our teachers and we do have teachers who can vouch for that. A high percentage of our teachers have stayed with us for more than 10 years. In fact that we have some who have been with us since 1989.
koolmama: I am very sorry that your experience with our school recently has been less than satisfactory. I see some of your concerns involve our teaching staff. Would you like to contact me directly via http://www.patschoolhouse.com/resources/ask-pat so my team and I can look into this? We value your feedback and would like to find out more on this.
Just so you are aware - when we selected the caterer last year, it was a company with a long history and was on NEA’s approved list, had a good track record and was able to cater food which met guidelines set by Health Promotion Board. We are sorry that this incident happened when it shouldn’t have and we will not take our own good health and that of our children’s for granted.
happychildren: I appreciate your thoughts and concern for your fellow colleagues’ and students’ welfare, and this is something that we should be able to address internally. I would really like to understand more about your specific observations and allegations in more detail. I invite you to send me a private email or a call so I can hear you out fully.
Laisee: Hi Laisee, I noticed in the tonality of your posts that you are very upset and angry. If you have had any direct experiences with any of our centres in the past, I appreciate if you will write to me directly via http://www.patschoolhouse.com/resources/ask-pat so I can help address them immediately with you. If you are currently a parent with a child at any of our centres, you would have received communication which directly addresses the issue of the preparation of food. Again, if the information provided to you is insufficient or unclear, I would like to hear from you. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Patricia Koh
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