SmartCubz: Custom Daycare Management Software with Parent & Staff Portals

SmartCubz is a custom daycare management software platform designed and built by The Code Kraft. It replaces manual enrollment, paper invoices, and scattered parent communication with one connected system that serves both families and childcare staff — across web, iOS, and Android.

Project Snapshot

The Challenge

Before SmartCubz, the childcare provider ran enrollment, billing, and parent communication through manual, disconnected processes that couldn't keep up as the business grew:

• Enrollment on paper and spreadsheets, making it hard to track who was signed up for which program.
• Manual invoicing and offline payments — slow, error-prone, and difficult to reconcile.
• No central hub for parents to view their child's information, enrollments, or bills.
• Communication scattered across phone calls, emails, and paper notes.
• Attendance and check-in/check-out logged by hand.

As the organization scaled across preschool, afterschool, and summer camp programs, this administrative overhead consumed staff time that should have gone to the children. They needed a single, reliable childcare management platform to run the whole operation.

The Solution

The Code Kraft designed and built SmartCubz as an end-to-end platform with two connected experiences: a parent portal for families and a staff portal for administrators. Parents self-serve everything from enrollment to payments, while staff manage programs, attendance, billing, and communication from one dashboard.

Programs the Platform Manages

SmartCubz is built to handle enrollment and administration across a childcare provider's full range of offerings:

• Preschool — programs for children ages 2 to 5, from first-classroom toddler groups through pre-kindergarten readiness.
• Afterschool — care and academic enrichment spanning kindergarten through upper-elementary grades.
• Summer Camp — specialty camps across arts, STEM, sports, coding, cooking, and public speaking, with flexible half-day and full-day options.

Each program supports configurable age groups, schedules, capacity limits, and pricing.

The Parent Portal

Delivered as a Flutter Web application and native iOS and Android apps, giving parents one convenient place to manage their child's daycare experience from any device:

• Secure parent login
• Add and manage their child's profile
• Enroll their child into available programs
• View invoices and complete billing history
• Add a credit card and pay bills directly in-app

The Staff Portal

The administrative side, where the childcare team runs daily operations from a single dashboard:

• Program management — configure preschool, afterschool, and summer camp programs, including age groups, schedules, and capacity.
• Enrollment & waitlist management — process enrollments and manage waitlists when programs fill up.
• Children & parent records — manage child profiles and linked parent accounts.
• Attendance & check-in/check-out — track daily attendance and drop-off/pick-up.
• Schedule & calendar views — see programs and daily operations at a glance.
• Billing & invoicing — generate invoices and track payment status.
• Messaging & announcements — send direct messages and broadcast announcements to parents.
• Document management — collect and store immunization records, enrollment forms, and other documents.
• Reports & analytics — dashboards for enrollment, attendance, and billing.
• Role-based access — superadmin and staff roles with distinct permission levels.

Technology Stack

• Frontend & Mobile: Flutter (Web, iOS, Android)
• Backend: PHP (Laravel)
• Database: MySQL
• Payments: Stripe
• Hosting & Infrastructure: AWS

This stack gives SmartCubz a single Flutter codebase across web and mobile, a robust Laravel API layer, secure Stripe-powered payments, and scalable AWS infrastructure built to handle peak enrollment and billing periods.

Results & Impact

SmartCubz transformed how the childcare provider operates:

• Replaced paper-based enrollment and manual spreadsheets with digital, self-service enrollment.
• Eliminated manual invoicing through automated billing and secure online card payments via Stripe.
• Gave parents a single self-service portal for their child's profile, programs, and bills — reducing day-to-day admin requests.
• Centralized parent–staff communication in one place, replacing scattered calls, emails, and paper notes.
• Provided administrators with real-time visibility into enrollment, attendance, and revenue.