Child Care Provider Issues
By Nicole Carlton, Early Childhood Educator Certificate Candidate, College of New Caledonia
Pgcitizen.ca
02 April 2008

I’m writing to you to address my growing concern surrounding the issue being faced in British Columbia regarding child care.

When we speak about child care, the first issue on people’s minds is the lack of spaces for children, however, in order to address the lack of child care spaces, the perspective of childcare providers must be taken into consideration. In Canada, we are seeing fewer talented people going into the child care field due to low wages, little recognition, difficult working environment and lack of job security. The situation of child care providers is tied with the lack of spaces for children. Low wages of child care providers results in few entering the field, many leaving the field and high turnover rates in Child Care, so even in facilities in which there are spaces, these spaces can not be filled due to staffing shortages.

The average salary in Canada for full time early child care educators or assistants is just over $19,000 per year and from 1997 to 2000, there was almost no change in salary! As the cost of living in B.C. has risen, there has been an exodus from the child care profession due to the fact that the salary of a child care worker does not meet their financial needs.  …the wages that they earn are not commensurate with their level of education.

Again due to low wages, there tends to be a great deal of turnover in child care, the hours are longer than the average work week (usually 40-45 per week in child care) with few breaks, if any. Even though, in Canada, we have worked hard to promote the importance of early childhood development, there are still many child care environments that do not provide the activities and environments that focus on promoting optimal child development. Trained ECE workers, who do not have a chance to use their training in an effective manner opt for other environments where they can use their skills. Although there is a clear link between quality child care and a quality work force, child care is viewed as having quite low status.

… there are still some mixed opinions, in part due to the ongoing debate as to whether child care is a public or a private matter. …These issues need to be addressed so that more people are attracted to enter and to remain in the field. …

Concerns from child care providers focused on the quality, accessibility and affordability of care, low wages for staff resulting in significant staff turnover, the need for more spaces to meet current and future needs, and financial viability issues. Parents also noted that they were bothered by the fact that they knew child care providers would not see an increase in their wages as a result of recent provincial policies. Parents worried that the morale of child care providers was negatively impacted by recent policy changes….