KidKare Training for Center Sponsors
What is STARS?
The S.T.A.R.S. acronym walks you through the steps to quickly take your CACFP management out of this world: Setup, Training, Assigned Center Training, Reports & Reviews, and Submitting Claims.
We suggest watching these training videos in order to achieve faster, easier CACFP claims.
STEP 1
STEP 2
STEP 3
STEP 4
STEP 5
Setup
1. Create Accounts for Sponsor Staff
Follow along to add any additional sponsor staff from your organization who might need access to KidKare.
2. Enroll Centers
Follow along to enroll your centers in KidKare.
3. Set Center Administrator Permissions
Control the access that your center directors have in KidKare.
4. Create Accounts for Center Staff
Add roles and permissions for site-level users.
Looking to streamline administrative duties amidst staff transitions? Consider establishing accounts for “classroom” staff rather than individual teachers. For instance, instead of generating an account for Sally, the Apple Classroom teacher, create one for the Apple Classroom itself. Watch this video to see it in action.
5. Send Welcome Letters
When you are ready to invite center administrators
Training
To Do: Send your participant rosters to training@kidkare.com if you haven’t already done so!
1. Enroll Children
Sponsors and centers can enroll children. If you don’t want to import child information in bulk, you can also add them individually.
2. Activate Children
Once children are enrolled, you’ll need to activate them so that their meals can be reimbursed. We recommend doing this on a regular basis instead of waiting until claims time every month.
Only children entered on the center side need activation. Children that are imported do not need to be activated.
3. Create Menu Templates
Do you have a rotating menu? Put your menus in once and never put them in again!
4. Create a Master Menu
Creating a master menu allows you to easily send your menu to all your centers at once.
Harness the power of KidKare’s Assign Menu feature to effortlessly craft a dynamic, shareable menu rotation with your centers. This ensures children enjoy a well-rounded diet over time, packed with essential nutrients from proteins, carbohydrates, fruits, vegetables, and dairy or suitable alternatives.
5. Use the Center Menu Calendar
Use the Menu Calendar to schedule future menus, review menus one month at a time, and visually check for any missing components or meals.
Double-Check the Menu Calendar for accuracy. Ensuring you’ve got all the meal components and enough food is key for the children’s well-being and ensuring compliance. Taking a quick look at your center’s menu calendar each week will smooth out any issues.
6. Record Individual Center Daily Menus
Record menus for any selected center as needed.
If you choose to use the Individual Infant Menu feature, you can enable your centers to track infant meals according to developmental readiness.
Assigned Center Training
To Do: Work with your Onboarding Specialist to assign training to your sites based on your specific needs.
1. Use Observer Mode
See through the eyes of your center and view information in real time.
2. Learn How Centers Record Attendance & Meal Counts
See how centers can use this helpful feature for easier, faster meal counts.
3. Learn How Centers Can Estimate Attendance
This optional feature can be very helpful in estimating food quantities required for planned menus.
If your state requires you to do so, you can record the actual amount of food that was served after each meal. This reflects the actual quantities served on the menu and Menu Production Record.
5. Learn How Centers Can Track the Milk Audit
If your state requires you to do so, your centers can easily track the milk audit in KidKare.
If you enable this optional feature for your centers, it can be a useful tool to track messages to centers and for centers to message parents and guardians.
If your centers will be managing their own menus instead of being assigned menus by your sponsoring organization, they will have access to Menu Templates, Menu Calendars, and Daily Menus as described in the videos above.
Reports & Reviews
To Do: View the resources below and practice running the Weekly Attendance + Meal Count Report to check if your centers are correctly tracking meal counts.
1. Utilize Reports
Familiarize yourself with the many helpful reports in KidKare.
Check out the Weekly Attendance + Meal Count Report to double-check all attendance and meal counts. Doing this weekly helps keep things accurate and boosts reimbursements! Just a heads-up: the software can only work with what’s entered, so missing meals mean missing money!
2. Assign Monitors & Track Reviews
Use the customizable KidKare Review Form or add manual reviews.
This helpful feature allows you to quickly account for summer vacation, holidays, or extended school closures.
Submitting Claims
To Do: You’re almost there! Schedule a call with your Onboarding Specialist to submit your first claim through KidKare.
1. Add & Manage Receipts
If you choose to track expenses in KidKare, first Add Vendors and then Add Receipts.
2. Run the Milk Audit
If your state requires you to do so, you can run the milk audit in KidKare.
3. Find More Claims Resources
After reviewing the claim submission process with your Onboarding Specialist, you may want a refresher each month. You can find many helpful resources on our Knowledge Base.
4. Submitting Claims - Checklist
Congratulations, you’re a KidKare STAR!
Join our office hours
Drop in during Office Hours to ask questions, learn best practices, hear about the latest updates, and connect with other members of the KidKare community.
When: Weekly Thursday from 11:30 to 12:30 CT.
Find more resources
Our robust Knowledge Base has even more videos and articles that will help you become a KidKare expert!
Register for a webinar
Throughout the year, the KidKare team hosts continuing education webinars on a variety of CACFP, childcare, and business topics.
Check out our Sponsor manual
Check out our training manual for step-by-step instructions on ALL the features KidKare has to offer:
