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@macintosh: just for a perspective on the potty thing my 3yo goes to a parochial preschool and I heard her teacher telling a mom at pickup that the mom will have to take him potty at drop off as he won't go all day and the teacher can't make him.

Eta when we were actively potty training I did take her potty at drop off just to help ensure no accidents however she's only there for a 3 hour morning

This sounds totally normal.

We were at an apple accredited school and it was the same thing. The ratios are much lower as infants but as kids get older it still was a lot of kids for one teacher.

drop-off is always going to be chaotic. There's a lot of extra people in the room disrupting normal activities and I wouldn't use it as a gauge for how the day would normally go. I would look up what the ratios are supposed to be for accredidation and discuss that with the director, however. They're using their status to be able to charge families more, so they need to follow the rules.

As for going potty. My son always said no if you asked him if he had to go. It led to him having accidents at school long after he was fully potty trained at home. It was simple enough to just not give him a choice and have the teachers tell him he needed to go use the bathroom. There never had to be a fight about it, he would just go to the bathroom when reminded.

I would raise the ratio issue but only because it violates NAEYC ratios. If they advertise for it, I assume charge a premium for it too, so that would bug me. In CA for preschool age kids, the ratio for toddlers (18-30 months) is 1:6 and preschoolers is 1:12. At dropoff in the breakfast room, they generally have 2 teachers at all times, but only because the headcount in the room will go over 12 at some point during dropoff and they will need to move an older set of kids and a teacher in to a second classroom for fire code reasons. It is kind of a zoo at drop off, but its totally fine to me personally. Half the kids are still eating, half want to play toys, everyone is pumped to see their friends - its just a crazy time in the morning. Same with our teachers - they kinda have to raise their voice to be heard, but they are all welcoming and pleasant.

The potty training thing I don't know. I feel like they can manage your son fine, but I don't see how they can force your kid to pee if he doesn't want to. My son is in a 2/3 combo class that has 12 kids on totally full attendance days (some kids are part time) and on lower days its 6-8. There is almost ALWAYS someone potty training or needing to go potty in his class. They almost always have 2 teachers or a teacher and an aide in his classroom. And if its 1 teacher on a lower attendance day and she needs to take one kid potty, the director will hop into the classroom (her office is right next door). So similarish ratios that your kid has, or worse. They recommend when the child/parent is ready at home to go full bore into potty training at school with no diapers and try to boot camp it for 2 weeks. When one kid has to potty, they usually ask all the potty training kids if they need to go as well and the herd mentality sorta helps. They also build it into the flow of the day - for example, let's all use the potty before recess, before nap, before whatever transition to the day. But if the kid wont go, there's nothing they can really do about it. They can try to wheedle them like "Please? Can you try?" But if the kid is like no, I can't get my kid to sit on the potty either.

@macintosh: The fact they were both on their cell phones would bother me more than anything else you've mentioned. Our day care has a very strict no cell phone policy for teachers when kids are in the room.

Yes the cell phones would not fly with me. I trained in a NAECY preschool when I was in high school. It's is a very strict program to be approved for and expensive. The things you are describing would not be done at an accredited place. Also I know a couple preschool teachers and they were never allowed to be the teacher in their child's class, so that strikes me as a bad practice.