If you’ve ever second-guessed the safety of your child’s car seat, you’re not alone. Fortunately, Melody Kent provides a solution right here in Milton.
Melody Kent is a certified Child Passenger Safety Technician (CPST) from the Child Passenger Safety Association of Canada (CPSAC). She works with parents and caregivers in Milton and the GTA to help ensure their children’s car seats are properly installed.
“I have an 18-month-old son, and when I was installing my car seat, I wanted someone to check it, make sure I was doing it correctly. And I couldn’t find somebody,” says Melody.
The CPSAC is a nationally certified organization that regulates all child passenger safety technicians across Canada to ensure everyone is on the same page regarding child safety.
Melody initially offered checks through the Milton Mommies Freebie Facebook page and found that she corrected a lot of misuse.
“75% of car seats are misused, or children are harnessed incorrectly. When I found out that stat, that drove me to increase my education in this department,” explains Melody.
Her primary focus is to meet with families or caregivers and educate them on the rules of car seats, how to install them, and proper safety measures, including proper use, general safety, and correct harnessing.
One of the services she offers is helping parents install their car seats. She encourages caregivers to attempt the installation themselves so they have a general knowledge of where the buttons are, how to loosen the harness, etc.
“I could go and do it for you,” Melody explains. “But the next time you have to clean your car, get a rental car, or it has to go into another caregiver’s vehicle, you need to know how to do it.”
She also has a checklist of topics that she covers with the families. Some topics she covers are unregulated products, bulky clothing, best practices for rear-facing, forward-facing, UAS latch clips, etc.
Melody also runs workshops to teach parents and offers shopping appointments. During these appointments, she visits stores like Babies R Us to help parents choose the best car seat for their vehicle.
“I meet people [at Babies R Us], and we test out different car seats and what fits in their vehicle because not every seat fits and not every seat works for every kid. So, we dry-fit them because once you purchase them, you own them, and you can’t return them,” Melody explains.
Melody also works with parents who are moving on from the infant phase and are curious when they can switch their car seats from rear-facing to forward-facing.
She is often asked, ‘What age can they go into a booster?’
“I don’t look at age at all. I look at your kid’s statistics, what’s their height, what’s their weight.” This is because Ontario laws are still behind current standards. Melody clarifies, “At 22 pounds, a baby can go forward-facing legally, which is quite scary because that was my son at about 7 months.”
Melody suggests keeping children rear-facing as long as possible because it’s the safest for the child. She also tries to help parents with their different parenting struggles.
Her plans for her business are to find people who want to have car seat events or anyone willing to lend her their parking lot. She’d love to have a whole-day event where people come and get their car seat checked, and they go through the checklist together.
Find Melody on Instagram, Facebook, and through the Child Passenger Safety Association of Canada. The Find a Tech tab has a map of all the techs across Canada with their contact information. Melody is the only one in Halton.
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