NDNA Nursery Awards – We Won!

On Friday 22 June 2018 our staff headed to the 15th annual National Day Nursery Association nursery awards ceremony having been short listed as finalists in the technology and nursery of the year categories. 

We had an eventful trip to the Ricoh Arena in Coventry, involving engine management lights, forgetting the tickets, dresses with holes in and being stuck in a two hour traffic jam but we made it with enough time to take a few selfies before the ceremony started.

After dinner we took our seats and waited for the ceremony to start.  Fortunately we didn’t have long to wait as the technology award was presented early in the ceremony.  The name of the runner up was announced and as it wasn’t us we started to think that maybe we had won but didn’t want to get too excited just in case. When our name was called and flashed onto the big screen as the winner we were delighted.  We then joined representatives from the NDNA and the sponsor Spark on the stage to collect our award.

The award recognises our excellence in teaching children how to use technology safely and appropriately as well as how it is used within the nursery to enhance the children’s learning and development.  It also encompasses how we use technology, namely the BabysDays software and social media, to communicate with parents and keep them updated with what their child is doing whilst at nursery. 

We then returned to our seats and continued our nervous wait for the Nursery of The Year – South award to be presented.  There were two other incredible nurseries in our category and we knew they would be tough competition.  Our name was called and we were awarded highly commended, we would have liked to take home to top prize but were really pleased to have come third and to be the only nursery in Kent to make it to the finals.  Not bad for a nursery that opened 8 years ago with only 6 children on roll!

Once again we would like to say a huge thank you to all of the parents that voted for us and made it possible to get to the finals of such as prestigious award.