We are Pilke
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Everyday life is lived in kindergartens, preschools andafter-school clubs.
10k+
We make a good day for more than 10,000 children every day.
2.5k
We employ over two thousand good day workers.
Pilke Päiväkodit Oy is a sustainably growing and versatile company serving Finnish families with children. We operate as a partner to Finnish municipalities in early childhood education, after-school activities and child care. We serve family-friendly companies that offer childcare as an employment benefit to their own employees.
Through our services, we help families balance the needs of children and adults for a smooth everyday life. Our mission is to create an environment where children learn not only knowledge and skills, but also how to face the world with kindness and heart.
We do our work driven by heart. It’s means gentleness is presence, listening and empathy. We know it can work wonders. We treat everything and everyone with gentleness, and we pass this on in our daily lives.
As the world around us changes at a frantic pace, we provide a safe and supportive environment for learning the skills of the future. That’s why our slogan is: Driven by heart.
Driven by heart
The beating heart of Pilke is our employees: more than 2,500 professionals specialised in early childhood education and care, healthcare and social services, and other fields.
We believe that people learn the best when learning happens as part of their daily life and their life as a whole. At Pilke, children can build their skills and knowledge, but most importantly, they grow into highly empathic people whose hearts are open to the world.
We see and recognise the unique abilities of each child and support their strengths. We are passionate about our work, and we build safe and inspiring learning paths for every child.
Daycare
We offer early childhood education in our day-care centres all over Finland. We give every child the opportunity to learn, wonder, ask questions, play and grow. Find out more and apply for a place!
After school clubs
A good afternoon for young schoolchildren is an afternoon of outdoor activities, play, hobbies, homework and snacks.
Childcare for families
Pilke Childcare help balance everyday family life with the needs of children and adults.
Childcare for businesses
Pilke childcare helps businesses balance work and family life.
Pilke is part of the international Dibber Group
Dibber and Pilke share a Nordic vision of early childhood education and pedagogy and a common set of values that promote the best interests of the child and quality early childhood education.
What is Dibber?
Pilke is owned by Dibber ,an international family business specialised in early childhood education and care services.
Dibber employs more than 9,000 people around the world and provides early childhood education and care to over 40,000 children.
The company operates in Norway, Sweden, Finland, Latvia, Germany, United Arab Emirates, South Africa and Hong Kong.
Information about Dibber
- Dibber was established by early childhood education teachers Randi and Hans-Jacob Sundby, a married couple.
- The first Dibber daycare centre opened in Norway in 2003.
- In 2020, the revenue of the entire Dibber Group was EUR 500 M.
- In Norway, Dibber operates under the trade name Läringsverkstedet. The company acquired Pilke Daycare Centres in 2020.
- In Finland, the parent company’s official trade name is Dibber Early Education Finland Oy.
Pilke values are about how we do our work and who we exist for.
Warm-hearted
We live the Heart Culture in our relationships with children, parents, and colleagues. We take a warm-hearted approach to every situation and create a safe, inviting environment around us.
Generous
We encourage our children, colleagues, and company to rise up to the challenges of an ever-progressing world. We are solution oriented, embrace collaboration, and give space for people to grow.
Playful
We create an environment of playfulness around us by nurturing a culture where we have fun, celebrate, and enjoy working in the Pilke family.
Driven
We set high goals for our children, colleagues, and company and believe we can achieve them, together, Pilke dares to dream big, imagining the possibilities, while embodying quality.
Committed
We commit to being our best by becoming lifelong learners who stay updated in our professions. Weendeavor to build a network of professionals who can support and inspire each other.
Professional
We have established a solid foundation that allows us to adapt and move forward while holding firm to our core. This allows us to adapt and move forward while holding firm to our commitments and core.
Responsibility can be seen and heard at Pilke
We are creating a better world for children’s learning and growth. For us, responsibility means high quality, sustainable development, social responsibility, and open financial reporting.
The services provided by Pilke are primarily funded by taxpayers’ money, which is why we must ensure that the municipalities who buy our services and the families who use them are satisfied. We explain the responsibility aspect of our operations to families as part of different presentations and guardians’ evenings.
How responsibility is reflected in our daily lives
Building new day-care centres and log construction
Since 2021, Pilke has invested €100 million in the construction of more than 50 day-care centres in Finland.
When we build new day-care centres, we account for the various environmental aspects of their design and planning.
We use geothermal heat whenever possible.
We use solar power at some of our units.
We install energy-efficient LED lighting.
We use sensors to optimise the energy consumption of our air conditioning systems.
We use natural materials such as logs, wood fibre sound insulation panels, and hypoallergenic floor surfaces.
Pilke has developed the concept of a sensory-friendly day-care centre with clean indoor air in cooperation with Hoivarakentajat Oy, Finland’s largest public log construction company.
Pilke’s environmental education and everyday actions for carbon footprint reduction
Pilke fulfils its environmental responsibilities in various ways during the daily lives of the children in our care. Environmental education is part of our early childhood education and care.
We use many natural materials and we reuse and recycle as part of our daily activities, for example. We make use of the local environment of our day-care centres and offices for environmentally-friendly outings to learn more about nature together.
We reduce the carbon footprint of our daily operations by reducing the amount of waste, including food waste, and sorting and recycling the waste that we produce, for example. Our responsibility thinking also includes our supply chains, and we prefer food suppliers who can offer locally produced food. We plan the children’s meals to be ethical and environmentally friendly, among other things.
The methods used to promote sustainable development vary slightly between day-care centres located in different municipalities because of differences in municipal recycling practices, for example.
We train our personnel and provide information and tools that help ingrain responsible operating methods into the daily work of Pilke’s early childhood education and care employees.
Pilke’s social responsibility as an employer
Part of our responsibility is supporting the professional development of our employees and their well-being at work. We prepare an annual well-being at work plan to support the welfare of our personnel. We monitor the job satisfaction of our employees.
We follow collective agreements and train our supervisors in the best practices for supporting subordinates in their duties.
At Pilke, diversity is a visible part of our workplace communities, customer families, and child groups. We have language-oriented day-care centres, and the communities of our English-speaking day-care centres are especially international in nature. We value diversity and are committed to equality and non-discrimination in our operations.