For Schools 1 - Sherpa Kids Ireland

Operating onsite at your school makes it very simple!

Operating onsite at your school makes it a very simple single drop off and pick up for your parents and pupils as they are with their peers in familiar surroundings.

Partnering with Sherpa Kids means there is no extra work for your school apart from some assitance at the very start helping us to make contact with your parents and helping us to decide where Sherpa Kids will be located on site.

After that, it is as if we are not there, as we look after everything from picking up your children, to billing parents and everything in between! There are huge benefits for your school and these are explained in the “Benefits to your School” section on our site.

Sherpa Kids Ireland | Onsite Care & Services

Loving To Learn

Well-Being

Free Play, Nutrition and Active Kids

A childs’ well being is the most imporatant aspect of their development and we believe this is the most important thing for us to embrace and nurture.

We have created a Sherpa Kids well-being philosophy which revolves around 3 distinct, yet connected areas of focus:

Free Play

Nurturing Ireland’s Teenagers Of Tomorrow

This really is a passion for us and one of the main drivers in our ambition to help nurture Ireland’s teenagers of tomorrow.

There is now significant research-based evidence demonstrating that undirected free play has profound beneﬁts on your child’s development, growth and wellbeing.

It can boost their character and personality, promote their physical development, develop their brain and mind, teach them emotional and social skills and improve their academic performance. From the cognitive to the physical, research shows that undirected free play can allow children to gain greater self-conﬁdence, promote neurological development, and even enhance their ﬁne motor skills.

Sherpa Kids Ireland | Free Play Activities Infographic

Download Infographic (7.2MB)

Healthy Snacks Are A Key Part Of All Sherpa Kids Days

Nutrition

Nutritious Snacks

Nutrition plays an equally important part in supporting your child’s well-being.

Sherpa Kids supports this by providing daily nutritious snacks for your child as well as educating them on the benefits of eating the right foods to ensure a healthy and happy life.

Active Kids

Active Kids Are Happy Kids

At Sherpa Kids we don’t rely on technology to entertain your child in our care.

It’s not that we are “anti-technology”, it’s more we believe it has its place and time.

We believe there are so many more ways to have fun and we want “our” kids to have fun, for fun’s sake.

Active Kids are happy kids and we try our very best at every opportunity to bring your child outdoors so they can enjoy the benefits of active play.

Kids Having Fun

9000

Sherpa Kids looks after over 9000 primary school children in their local community EVERY day!

265

We have over 265 schools worldwide including over 50 local schools in Ireland

500

We offer globally over 500 programmes DAILY!

1300

Our teams deliver over 1,300 hours of FUN delivered every day across our network.

our services

A service that YOU WILL BE PROUD to say is part of your school’s offering.

We understand that in allowing Sherpa Kids to operate in your school that you are putting your established reputation in our hands and that is something we value hugely.

The Sherpa Kids brand is based on a genuine passion to deliver, through collaboration, a high quality and safe service, built on a solid business platform. It can also create ﬁnancial value for your school, as well as social value.

Our health, safety and compliance processes and procedures and regulations are second to none and indeed more stringent and detailed than the current regulation introduced in February 2019 by the DCYA and Tusla®.

We regularly review our businesses documentation and at least once a year physically inspect our services to ensure they are achieving the maximum standards we expect at Sherpa Kids. We set the bar extremely high.

With regulation increasing in the school age childcare sector we benefit from already operating in highly regulated markets such as the UK and Australia. You can safely rely on Sherpa Kids to be vigilant in maintaining these standards through the ongoing training of our colleagues and school operating partners.

Sherpa Kids is a school age childcare solution you can trust to have in your school as we:

20 YEARS

Our team have over 20 YEARS OF PROFESSIONAL SERVICE AND EXPERIENCE.

GLOBAL EXPERIENCE

We have established INTERNATIONAL BEST PRACTICE from operations around the world.

TULSA

Sherpa Kids Ireland and our programmes are a Tusla® REGULATED SERVICE.

FLEXIBLE MODEL

All our programmes provide a FLEXIBLE MODEL which is tailored to meet your school’s needs.

FINANCIAL BENEFITS

Sherpa Kids Ireland delivers FINANCIAL BENEFITS through an agreed revenue share with our locations.

TOTAL SOLUTION

Our experienced team ensure there is NO ADDITIONAL WORK for your staff – we take care of all the administration.

EQUIPMENT

Across all our locations in Ireland, our team PROVIDE ALL our OWN EQUIPMENT.

SUPERVISED HOMEWORK

Our team at each location deliver SUPERVISED HOMEWORK periods for your pupils.

ADDED VALUE

With us onsite, we provide an added value service for your school, helping to ATTRACT NEW ENROLMENTS.

EXTRA-CURRICULAR

Our teams create EXTRA-CURRICULAR SUPPORT – we wrap around current activities the school may operate.

WE HELP

While onsite, our team can provide an EXTRA PAIR OF HANDS at Parent events or Sports days etc

REPORTING

Our onsite team deliver CONCISE REPORTING to you, your Board of Management and Parent’s Association.

PRIDE

We ensure you will have a service that YOU WILL BE PROUD to say is part of your school’s offering.

LOW-INCOME FAMILIES

We can help LOW-INCOME FAMILIES with childcare subsidies by offering National Childcare Scheme.

SHERPA KIDS IRELAND HEAD OFFICE TEAM

Supporting our local communities

John Miles

Managing Director

John is the Managing Director of Sherpa Kids Ireland and is an outcome driven individual with a proven track record of successfully shaping and managing businesses to deliver operational and regulatory excellence. His strong background in leadership, driving change management by mentoring start-up businesses across sectors, arms him with the skills, drive and gravitas for the changing Irish childcare environment. The environments in which John excels are generally characterized by a focus on continuous improvement, creative idea generation, clarity of decision making and the capacity and mandate to mobilise solutions. John’s motivation is to create a real social value within Sherpa Kids Ireland so that they can truly support Ireland’s families.
*John is pictured with his grandson Ruaidhri.

Anne Marie Hegarty

Director of Operations

Anne Marie is the Director of Operations for Sherpa Kids Ireland and the Managing Director of our Head Office services division. Being the eldest of 8 and growing up on a farm in Ardfield in West Cork she began to learn about childcare at a very young age. She still lives in Ardfield and has two children of her own. She understands the needs of parents when it comes to childcare and the need to support families who don’t have a family network close by to help out. Anne Marie’s motivation is to change children’s lives for the better – something she constantly instills in all of her colleagues.
*Anne Marie is pictured with Ava & Liam.

Charlene O’ Toole

Operations

Charlene is one of our General managers who look after the day to day running of our services. She has been working in the childcare sector from the age of 16 and has had numerous roles within early years and SAC settings. In 2015 she joined Sherpa Kids in Clonakilty as a Programme Manager and has been with us ever since progressing to Head Office and the role she now occupies. She is currently responsible for 11 of our services in the counties of Cork, Dublin, Waterford, Longford and Westmeath and brings her sense of kindness, fun and fair play to all she interacts with. Charlene’s motivation is to help children be the best that they can be.
*Charlene is pictured with Nathan & Madison.

Karen Deasy

General Manager, Support Office Services

Having worked in the Early Years and School Aged Childcare sector since 2011, Karen joined the Sherpa Kids team in January 2020 having managed a stand-alone Afterschool service for 6 years. Karen holds a First Class Honours B.A in Early Childhood Studies, certification in Child Psychology from Portobello Institute and most recently a Certificate in Digital Marketing from Cork’s Institute of Technology. Karen is responsible for our services around Cork City and neighbouring Kinsale and Carrigaline and brings her happy and real can do personality to bear in the running of these 9 services. Karen’s motivation is to motivate others and to encourage self-belief and positivity in both young and old.
*Karen is pictured with her nephew Cathal.

Find Out More

Some frequently asked questions from schools

What qualiﬁcations do Sherpa Kids colleagues have

Sherpa Kids is a professional organization. Our strict policy is ensure our colleagues are qualiﬁed in childcare. They always possess a minimum of a FETAC Level 5 qualiﬁcation in childcare and in a lot of cases a higher qualiﬁcation than this. On top of that they are all trained and qualiﬁed in Child Protection, Paediatric First Aid, Fire Safety and are Garda vetted. We have a strict Policies and Procedures Manual that we ensure all staff adhere to and this is developed in line with your school’s values and ethos.

We don’t have the time, resources or money to invest in a School Aged Childcare service

You don’t need any of the three to have Sherpa Kids operating in your school as we take care of all the administration. From booking, to billing, to liaising with parents, Sherpa Kids runs all of the administration associated with the service and we make every effort not to add to you and your team’s already heavy workload. All our sites are fully supplied with Sherpa Kids resources and we use our own equipment 100% of the time. And, as for the money – well all our services operate a revenue share scheme with the school whereby we share an agreed percentage of our revenue with you, making packing bags at the supermarket a fundraiser of the past.

The insurance cost will be too much

Sherpa Kids services have their own individual insurance policies and these will be on display. This is not an extra cost for the school and will always be a cost borne by Sherpa Kids.

We just do not have the space for the service

Sherpa Kids can be extremely ﬂexible when it comes to ﬁnding space to operate a before or after school care service. We operate mainly in empty classrooms, resource rooms, school halls or unused pre-fab buildings in the school yard. If none of these options are available, we can operate a “pop-up” service anywhere in the school where we set up on a daily basis and tidy away as if we hadn’t been there. We already do this in a number of schools.

We have other after school activities – we don’t want to displace them

And neither do we. However, the fact of the matter is that for working parents having an after-school activity that ﬁnishes at 4pm is of little beneﬁt if they are working until 5.30pm. At Sherpa Kids we embrace all other extra-curricular activities and provide a wrap-around service so that the kids can enjoy the variety of activities and still come to Sherpa Kids afterwards. We ﬁnd that when Sherpa Kids operates in a school, attendance at these activities tends to increase, not decrease.

Join the list of school principals who have partnered with Sherpa Kids.

We have global partnerships with over 260 schools and growing, with 50 schools here in Ireland. Complete the form below or more information on how we can assist your local school community or feel free to get in touch with one of the Sherpa Kids Team:

John Miles | Managing Director – [email protected]
Anne Marie Hegarty | Director of Operations – [email protected]
Charlene O’Toole | Operations Manager – [email protected]
Karen Deasy | General Manager, Support Office Services – [email protected]

"The personnel from Sherpa Kids were always professional in dealing with all members of the school community: staff, Board of Management, parents and students. Their preparation was done with the utmost care, yet it was unobtrusive to the day to day running of the school. The children enjoy the before and after school activities and Sherpa Kids facilitate parents hugely. Sherpa Kids is an asset to the school and we wish them every continued success."

"We are delighted that the Good Shepherd National School in Churchtown was the ﬁrst school in South Dublin to welcome Sherpa Kids to our school. Róisín and her Sherpa Kids team offer a fantastic, professional service to our parents and pupils. It’s ‘One Stop Drop and Collection Service’ gives parents peace of mind that their children are being cared for in a setting they are familiar with and are experiencing fun, stimulating before and after school activities with their school friends."

"Sherpa Kids offers an invaluable service to our families where our pupils are cared for in a safe and welcoming environment. The feedback from our families has been overwhelmingly positive and parents are very appreciative of the ﬂexibility of care that Sherpa Kids provides. We are delighted to be partners with Sherpa Kids as they embrace the child-centred spirit of our school."

"Sherpa Kids offers an invaluable service to our families where our students are cared for in a safe and welcoming environment. As a parent, I understand the importance of a secure and reliable childcare and on behalf of our school population I thank Sherpa Kids most sincerely for choosing our school."

"What I was impressed with was that they adapted to the schools needs because it was important for us that we tailor a product that the parents would need. The children really enjoy it and they participate in so many different activities after school that are a great beneﬁt to them."