$10 per day childcare - celerbation or concerned

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 So want to say “for now” to all those answers from politicians and advocates like the AECEO and OCBCC for this … based on historical precedent of what happens when the government is responsible for the majority of funding I find it hard to trust promises like “ratios won’t increase” also do not see funding being distributed equitably to see improvement to wages across the board - large licensed centres are going to end up eating up the majority of funding because well they are the least financially viable model of childcare and have the highest overhead model and overtime easy to hypotheses that there will be less and less for the tiny amount of licensed home childcare that is currently is represented in the licensed model let alone if the “unregulated sector” starts to try to migrate over placing more demand on said funding that’s been allotted which is based on the currently model that only meets 25% of the actual childcare used in Ontario. 

 

Again based on precedents of history - hate to keep saying it but look at Quebec …. despite the sector being unionized for 25 years now their home childcare sector, under this same model being represented here, gets the scattered crumbs that are leftover and preCovid had started roaring strikes because 25 years in and home childcare was still making LESS than minimum wage because they were getting away with paying them daily rates vs hourly wages and the length of the days just kept increasing as parents worked longer hours and had longer commutes you know to help pay for these programs … and this is despite the reality that home childcare has the least amount of overhead, provides the lowest ratios/group sizes for children and the access to a responsive attentive primary caregiver throughout their early years journey that all the brain and trauma informed research shows is vital to success in the early years. 

 

Currently licensed programs cannot properly staff programs NOW where are they gonna get all these new staff from to open up new spaces or to be home coordinators for agencies?

How quickly are we gonna see more and more centres who currently only hire ECE because they believe that’s what high quality program should be having to resort to hiring unqualified staff a because of shortage and b because they can pay them LESS and the burden of the pressure from the government not funding enough in wages to keep up that practice - which is gonna put more responsibility on the ONE RECE required per group because with the CECE and protected practice laws the non qualified staff are not SUPPOSED to be doing program planning, discussing development with parents and array of other “only a RECE” can do

As always people get hyped about the sound bytes and then are greatly disappointed by what actually rolls out! 

 

FDK is almost 20 years in between the pilots and than the full roll out is STILL underfunded and looks NOTHING like what was promised

Based on conversations with peers I it is likely that majority of home childcare providers will WAIT and see what actually rolls out before being concerned about this … I am willing to guess that any families going on wait lists NOW for this new program will likely have children in university before they actually opening up spaces for them! 

 

I would also bet money that the majority of these 86,000 spaces being promised  of which 15,000 are already been already created in 2019 and counted in this promise will be for SCHOOL AGE children and not the 0-4 age group which they do NOT tend to open up  too many of at a time in comparison! School age care is the ONLY care that can actually balance an operational budget because their ratios are so much higher than current infant and toddler or even preschool programs which is why programs choose to focus on those age groups with school age and preschool spaces being in abundance and toddler and infant spaces in great demand in the licensed sector!

 

And I have to say it once again if parents cannot access this 'social support' $10/day program to let a parent stay home and DIY their own childcare or get their nanny, extended family member or neighborhood home childcare costs covered via the program too than it’s NOT gonna fit the definition of ‘universal’. At best based on the current landscape it is going to be a very expensive investment that is only reaching 25% of the children in Ontario and that just does not seem like a EQUITABLE investment in the early years or respecting CHOICE for Ontario families!

 

Can’t help but be concerned about the future generations that are gonna come up through this model specially when again the research that shows that Quebec’s long term studies on the actual social/emotional and mental health outcomes for their program users has been alarmingly poor So sure the program got more parents into the workforce cause both can work but at what TRUE COST to children and families living there cause there’s more valuable things in life than lost INCOME.

 

Hug your little ones tight and if you believe in a higher power pray that today's announcement about Ontario joining the Federal government's $10/day platform turns out to actually be beneficial to the CHILDREN it is meant to serve as building blocks for their life long learning path! 

 

For the first time in two years I ironically now have something to be grateful for with the pandemic having closed my own early learning program and my health having forced me to retire from practicing early childhood education for the time being - I can advocate from the sidelines without the stress of having to live through this uncertainty of roll out first hand! 

 

Changes in childcare have never run smoothly as they rolled out and sadly far too often caused more stress and work for those on the front line than benefiting them! 

 

Margaret

Live, Laugh, Love

Be Totallyawake4-life

 

 

 

Be careful what you wish for...

 Lots of big feelings going on in early childhood educator groups right now! Lots of talk about unions and walk outs and advocating for the poor treatment ECE face in the field! 

With the current model of childcare I just want to share that ECE need to be careful what they wish for!

The College of ECE is also a prime example of the advise “be careful what you wish for”! 

ECE had fought for decades to get one cause the field thought that is what we were missing on the path to being valued and respected like Teachers - Teachers have one so should we they argued. It will raise the bar and prevent unprofessional ECE from just moving centre to centre spreading their negativity and poor behaviour! We will finally be seen as professional. Yet the reality is that majority of public has no clue we even have a College more than a decade in and when it comes to regulating the industry if you look at the disciplinary records you have to basically REPEATEDLY abuse children to have your ability to practice completely removed - too many brought up for having slapped, dragged and sat on children to manage their behaviours and they get a tap on wrist of a suspension, a fine and behaviour and guidance training and back to the front line they go  because there are so FEW of us left they want to keep trying to raise the bar with people who shouldn’t really be working in the field at all but when other RECE keep seeing these people returned to the front line they just stop reporting because they don’t see the point cause it’s stressful to report a colleague and the drama that’s created in ones program 😞 Plus in my view many centres management still do their best to sweep problem staff under the rug because they don’t want to publicly be on record for having  hired people that turned out to do crap like that under their nose so they still quietly let those types go and move on to be someone else’s problem. So now we are all paying $160 for a College we feel failed in providing what we thought it would. 

Be careful what you wish for  is the same feeling I get in my gut when I see so many ECE advocating to get a Union in their centre or thinking they can just unionize the entire industry despite that not being how unions work - they can only unionize those under one employer so each individual centre would be a tiny little union of their 5-15 RECE depending on licensing capacity  - so they need to truly be careful what you wish for cause union dues are gonna be way more than the College fees they hate paying and the reality is that a union cannot get blood from a stone! 

Look at how poorly EA and ECE working in a unionized school board setting are treated - they are unionized and still paid barely a living wage, still not getting adequate prep time and most are constantly keep on contract vs getting full time permanent cause it saves boards money - been over 10 years of negotiations for RECE there and not much progress despite the huge dues they have to pay 😉

Fact is we are not poorly paid because we are like the auto industry where some CEO is off making millions off us and share holders need their piece of the pie too and while we do similar work the reality is we are not like teachers working in the public school system  where they have the collective pockets of tax payers to cover the rising cost of teachers wages and other perks they’ve fought decades for   .... the stone cold fact is that childcare is funded primarily on the backs of the families we serve and THAT is why we are low paid because families with young children are already stretched so thin with rising costs of living including that of childcare that a household income of $80,000 is now the cut off for being able to access fee subsidy towards childcare! More than double it was in the past decades cause I remember when it was $30,000 that was the cut off to access it. 

Go ahead and form a union at your centre but go into with your eyes open that until there is a HUGE change in the way that childcare is funded you could be spending hundreds in dues annually for no real gain OR you can find that your program administration decides that it’s just not a feasible option to remain open and find yourself closed .... look at how many unionized childcare positions have been lost over the past 30 years! When I was an ECE student EVERY college and university campus that offered early childhood studies had their own on site lab schools with unionized well paid educators as part of their staff - how many are left in Ontario? So many regions also had their own childcare programs they ran with unionized staff - how many are left in Ontario? When local regional governments decide that they cannot continue to run a region funded childcare program that had unionized staff so pays fair equitable wages and benefits  because it’s constantly in the red and having to take money from other places cause they can’t raise fees to clients any higher than they have without parents just saying “might as well stay home and provide care myself” than how are small individual childcares or even the chains that unionize going to be able to magically do better 😞 

Do they still require ECE students to design and build and formulate a realistic operating budget for opening a childcare in College - cause when you do that you quickly see there is no PROFIT in childcare programs - your revenue is capped by licensed capacity and the wages you can pay by the overhead required to provide the program including paying whomever “oversees” it be it a non profit director or an owner and wage that makes taking on that kind of responsibility and risk viable for them! Non profits do have an advantage to typically pay better because being a charitable organization they can often get reduction in rent, phone and other utilities as the service providers can claim that reduction as a charitable donation. But reality is that despite the demand for childcare very few people are willing to donate the time, energy and resources to open new childcare spaces because the fact is it’s TOO HARD and most people don’t want to “volunteer” the time it would take to fundraising and sit on committees for the non profit sector and for the private sector you can invest the same money in opening a Tim Hortons chain and it provides an actual return in investment and profit - which is why there is a Tim Hortons on every corner and not a childcare centre 😞 

Early years matter but is there just possibly a better system we could be advocating for?

Margaret 

Live, Laugh, Love

Be Totallyawake4-life

Happy Childcare Worker and ECE Appreciation Day!

 

Tomorrow Thursday October 22nd is Childcare Appreciation Day in Ontario ... during the pandemic so many of my peers have risen to the challenge of taking on yet more risk and responsibility due to the pandemic and have done so with little to no additional resources or support provided to them by the government that deemed them 'essential' but than put in policies that once again ripped the rug out from underneath them by create diminishing their resources and making empty promises of support like PPE and so forth which 3 weeks into October many have still not recieved this months allotment of PPE and yet they are at work making due with either providing their own or reusing what should be expired PPE.

They rise like this because not only because they KNOW that working parents rely on their services but because sadly for so many of them they have NO CHOICE but to yet again being asked to rise and do more with less because they are working pay cheque to pay cheque, often multiple jobs, because despite the cost of childcare to family's that money does not roll over to them much of that goes to 'overhead' of operating so they are so under paid that missing even one day of work can mean a bill goes past due or they cannot make their rent! They rise because if they do not they risk drowning!

My hat is off and my heart is so full for all those who are out on the front line now giving it their all and with a smile and happy demeanor for the children in their care despite the burdens upon their shoulders - because early childhood educators and childcare providers are SUPER HEROES! They should be valued and appreciated EVERY DAY and our government should do MORE to show that they are valued!

To all my peers - you ROCK!

 

Margaret

Live, Laugh,Love

Be Totallyawake4-life

Stop demonizing PRIVATE childcare operators

PSA for those who do not understand how childcare WORKS and a rant about those who continue to demonize 'private childcare' who should know how it works but do not seem to GET IT .... the stereo types around non profit being better verses private being substandard greedy villains drive me bonkers! 

I have listened to this rhetoric for 30 years working in the field for both non profit and private models and now operate my own private home based early learning program because after 17 years in 'licensed' sector I was just DONE with the constant changes that to me reduced the quality of the program with increased ratios and paperwork and policy that took time away from children and add little to no value to their actual early learning experience .... but I can tell you there is no PROFIT in Ontario childcare! If there were we would see childcare popping up beside every Tim Horton's and there would be no shortage of childcare! 

If there was a profit in childcare we would see business rise to meet it and being offering affordable childcare for ALL!

Reality is that regardless of the funding model we all operate under the same revenue cap of our license capacity as well as all face the same 'staffing' requirements under same licensing capacity and have the same fixed expenses around insurance requirements and other legislated expenses - so the only wiggle room for is for those things that are not FIXED - so their rent they might pay for their space and the ability to find 'money' not earned through their license - so fundraising or grants! 

I have worked for a non profit in my current region I live that paid me LESS than the private one I had left when I had to relocate ... and it was not a small non profit a 'chain' of over 14 centres. It was also very top heavy with 'management' positions that did very little for the 'front line' support.

The reality is that the only difference in private VS non profit is the priority that management/owners give to allocating funds they have to work with! There are non profits that divert disproportionate funds to management heavy salary positions so the front line has less resources and there are privately funded programs where the management is only the owner or the owner and a RECE supervisor and so there is more left for the front line!
And yes there are childcare programs where the 'owner' is rarely around but lets face it there are non profits where the 'Director' is rarely round either - they are out networking and doing other stuff so again BOTH models have management that are not hands on support to the front line but they also both have those who ARE ... again not the funding model but the HUMANS working in them! 

Non profits also have access to larger disproportionate funding from government, often they are able to secure FREE or REDUCED rent due to their charitable status, they get discounts on phone services and other services for same reason that reduce their overhead .... but yet there are still non profits that are poor quality programs because, and I will say this again for the people in the back, its not about the funding model its about the HEART/VALUES behind whose is running the program! And sadly there are people whose heart is in the wrong place in ALL models of childcare - just like in ANY profession there are those who excel and those who really should choose a different journey!

This post was sparked by someone comment that 'of course the greedy private childcare operators will be ready to open their programs on Friday' in face of the news this week that we can reopen as of tomorrow! IMO the far likely reason that 'privately owned' childcares might be ready to open this Friday is that they did not wait on the Ontario government to tell them what to do - they likely spent the last few months researching what every other country ahead of us was doing and started to formulate a plan and source the things they felt they were likely to need on their own because they have their heart and soul and all their own finances tied up in funding their childcare program and if it goes under they are not just out of a 'job' they are out their entire personal investment they have made! 

Honestly until all the people demonizing the private model want to step up and open NON PROFITS themselves can we please stop demonizing people who see a need in their community and rise to meet it .... the fact is that the challenge with operating a non profit is no one wants to VOLUNTEER to do all the hard work to get one up and running and to keep people sitting on the board that is required but yet they cast stones at those who see the need but want to be PAID for their hard work and the risk of their own funds and investment on an industry that has a capped revenue potential and go out of their way to try to make them drown with unfair funding and grants and campaigns .... you can invest in a Tim Hortons franchise or you can invest in opening a childcare centre in Ontario which one is the 'better investment' if all you are concerned about is sitting at home rolling in the PROFIT ... hence why there is a Tim Hortons on every corner and NOT a childcare centre 🙄
 
Rant over

Have a great day

Margaret
Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much
Be Totallyawake4-life

Passionately Advocating for CHOICE in Childcare

Update on Bill 66/CCEYA, 2014 Proposed Amendments:

The Child Care Providers Resource Network (CCPRN) has applied to speak in front of the committee and fingers crossed that they are approved as they are an amazing voice for supporting Independent Childcare providers in Ontario the reality is that many independent home childcare providers will not be able to apply to the Standing Committee to present directly in person because we either cannot afford to take time off work or we are not comfortable leaving all our clients without childcare for a day to go and advocate for our own viability or the distance to travel to be there in person is not feasible I wanted to share that your voice still matters!!! BE HEARD! 

You can send in a written submission detailing the points on why you support the proposed changes to the CCEYA as it affects independent home childcare viability to comm-generalgov@ola.org and you can CC the Minister of Education minister.edu@ontario.ca

All written submissions go to the Standing Committee and become part of the Committee exhibit and will form part of the permanent public record of the Committee. 

Deadline for application to present is tomorrow, the deadline for a written submission is March 18th.

Please let the Ford government know what you advocate for in childcare. Otherwise each side of the debate on this will assume your silence, one way or another, supports what they are advocating for which is vastly different!

Below if you care to read is my stance on the key components of the Bill 66 as it affects childcare and my letter to the Standing Committee.

To whom it may concern;

I am writing today as an Early Childhood Educator who has called the early years my home for 30 years now. I am writing because I cannot attend the Standing Committee hearings in person but want my voice to be heard on the matters being raised in Bill 66. 
I have worked in both licensed and independent 'unlicensed' sector of the industry over the course of my career so have an in depth knowledge of both and their pros and cons for but working environment for staff as well as learning environments for children. I left the licensed centre industry in 2007 shortly after I completed a year long course on inspirations out of Reggio Italy and how they view children and how they learn. I made this choice because the more I reflected on what I now knew about brain development, about the needs of children in the early years and how I believed children learn best I came to realize that a small HOME setting could offer children what a large centre will never able to due to the constraints of that setting. I also left because I came to realize that a small home setting could also address some of my own work life balance, health and stress to my body challenges I was facing working in a large institutional setting. As a result I have spent the last decade passionately supporting the choice of home childcare as a viable long term solution to the access of affordable childcare challenges faced in Ontario. Home childcare is a hugely untapped resource and finding a way for the government to better 'independent' childcare providers are KEY to tapping that resource!  

For me the suggested changes in #Bill66 for childcare are a first step but IMO more should be done to restore viability, clarity and fairness in the home childcare industry.
So up until 2014 LEGAL independent home childcare providers provided childcare to 5 children ALL of whom they could have chosen to be under 2 if they wanted. It was up to them and their clients to determine their skill and comfort level and most providers naturally balanced a mixed age group for their own sanity and those who could rock the multiple young infants did so because they could rock the multiple infants safely! PLUS their own were included in this number so they are accustom to having more than 5 children in care of mixed age up to 10 years of age. The majority have done this SAFELY while offering quality program and choice to families in their community. We need to remember that while horrible incidents all 'deaths and serious injuries' reported in auditor general report on childcare occurred in ILLEGAL childcare programs – they were not following the rules and a license would not have changed that because there are LOTS of licensed childcare programs reported in that same auditor general’s report that were operating 'outside the laws' and on probationary licenses as a result yet still gave parents the 'illusion' of all is well cause they were licensed!

The 2 under 2 and 3 under 3 restrictions of licensed home childcare were WHY many independent providers resisted licensing before this change came into effect in 2014 because they felt that they were HYPERCRITICAL! Mothers for centuries have SAFELY raised multiple children of young ages without the government stepping in. The reality is to imply that it is 'unsafe' to care for more than 2 children under 2 in a home setting is an insult to every parent of 'multiples! It is also hypocritical because the ratios in large 'centres' are much higher and the safe number of children one adult should care for should be consistent across ALL models to help reduce the argument for one model to operate 'illegal' because they see the other operate that way and be considered 'legal'.

IMO this proposed change to 3 under 2 is more in line with licensed 'centre' care ratios where one adult can care for FIVE children, and in my experience having worked in licensed childcare, all of whom may be under the age of two ranging from 16 months to 24 months in age. Than on top of that higher ratio for up to six hours a day in a centre one adult can care for up to EIGHT children ALL of who might be under 2 depending on the enrollment in that room! If that is deemed 'safe quality care' in a centre than surely allowing for one adult to have 5 children and of those allowing for 3 of them be under 2 years of age is more consistent in how centres operate?

Plus, unlike when the original Day Nursery Act was created and maternity leave was only 6 weeks of age so perhaps it made more sense with its 'restrictions' on how many under 2 children one adult should ideally care for because they would be under 2 for a very long time, we now have Maternity leave in Ontario that is between 12 – 18 months. It is 2019 now and many children entering care are well over a year old so the likelihood of a provider having two children who are non-walkers for any length of time is VERY minimal and in my experience with proper fire drill and emergency practices even if ALL your children are non-walkers you can safely manage evacuation of children in a timely manner be it in a home setting or a centre setting. The key is to be proactive and PRACTICE that something sadly many do not think to do but that is where education is needed not necessarily a 'license' because IMO even FAMILY households that do not operate a business of childcare should be practicing this monthly!

For me the Ford governments proposed changes do not go far enough in the way a providers 'own children' are counted with the change to their own childcare 4 and up not counting ... personally I think when it comes to offering childcare for a fee to others ALL children under 13 should count in a childcare provider ratio regardless if the provider gave birth or not. HOWEVER I think they need to adjust the total ratio of how many children one provider can care for to include up to 3 school age children so 8 children in total a mix of your own or daycare clients or all daycare clients should not matter. As this change could definitely help to clarify what is 'legal' vs 'illegal' in the community when choosing childcare because currently one provider can care for 10 children 'legally' if 5 are their own children and another provider with 10 children even if they are all the same ages is considered 'illegal' because their children are all grown and out of the house now. Suddenly that provider is seen as only capable of caring for 5 children despite the demand in her community for more care. In my opinion this inequity and hypocritical approach actually encourages both provider and parents to choose to operate 'illegally' in communities where childcare is in high demand and ‘need’ is great because they can rationalize that the 'rules' are illogical and hypocritical and therefore can justify breaking them. Amending this rule would not only provide clarity on legal vs illegal but it would open up potential 'school age' programming in communities across Ontario where it too is in great demand AND it could encourage seasoned home childcare providers to REMAIN in the industry once their own children reach 13 because they could begin to make a more viable long term income in order to save for retirement and so forth with the additional income school age spaces would offer verses closing up shop because they can now make more money working in retail or service industry than they can as a home childcare provider because they cannot use the ‘balance’ that they are saving on childcare for their own childcare against the income they make in this profession.

As for increased oversight of industry – I agree it is needed. I personally wish that the government would require a 'public registry' at a SMALL fee for ALL home childcare providers where they had to self-declare that they had read the rules, agree to abide and followed the rules and IF there are PROVEN public complaints than that person is REMOVED from active registry and a WARNING placed to the public. Similar to the College of ECE does currently but for ‘home childcare sector’ as this would help ensure SOME oversight and accountability, it would ensure that providers KNOW the rules so cannot deny they didn’t know and parents could also search registry for providers and ensure they've not had issues. This should be able to be done with MINIMAL cost to either providers or government in comparison to the currently option of an 'agency' model as the ONLY choice for oversight.

As for who should ‘fund’ oversight of the childcare industry I think BOTH the business provider AND the government should share the burden fairly – however it should not be done via a forced agency model as currently done. - IMO if done properly ensuring safe, healthy environments could be done via a registry at a fraction of a cost and providers can source professional development and support through already government funded Early ON programs. Sadly the current agency model is like forcing people to have a 'business coach'. We do not all need a 'coach' as the majority of us can operate independently and offer quality programming just fine!

As for the 'health and safety' standards being ensured again IMO the basic ‘health and safety’ expectations of society for ANYONE caring for young children, family member or for a fee to others, should be the SAME for ALL regardless if it’s a family member caring for the child, if it’s a neighbor, a home childcare provider or a LICENSED centre. So in regards to the question 6-8 on this survey from the HCCAO YES I agree that ALL people caring for children should not be known child abusers or pedophiles those people should not have unsupervised access to any children even their own, they should have first aid and CPR, they should regularly inspect their home for health and safety, they should have working fire alarms and carbon monoxide detectors, they should have proper home and care insurance for their model of care, they should ensure that their equipment for children is up to date and not expired, they should ensure any pets in the home are properly vaccinated, they should keep medications safely out of reach of children …. ALL of them including PARENTS should be held to these standards of health and safety for children in their care and you do not need a LICENSE to do that! What you need is better public education of what ‘health and safety’ is and to VALUE that these are indeed things you SHOULD be doing regardless of who is looking over your shoulder. – IME if you DON’T value them licensed or not you will NOT do them when people are not watching and in that end licensing provides a 'false sense of security' to parents who assume that if licensed a program is ALWAYS complaint and as the auditor generals report showed for licensed care this is NOT the case there are lots of non-complaint programs out there who do not value certain rules therefore do not follow them, including adult to child ratios, even when caught not following them. YET they continue to be allowed to be licensed but with a 'probationary' note that most parents using childcare do not even know to LOOK FOR :(

I was with an agency when I first opened my program – I became independent shortly after because I wanted to keep all my resources on the front line to invest back in my own program not someone else’s business, my clients still get the SAME great program but its more affordable because all the resources are kept on the front line and the reality is the supports that an agency provided that I actually need can be sourced at a fraction of a cost elsewhere via Early On programs and other professional development agencies where I can choose what is needed vs an agency choosing what they think we 'need'!

Do not get me wrong the agency model serves a purpose for providers who NEED the help with finding clients, development of contracts and policy handbooks, who do not want to be responsible to bill and receive fees and just want to 'work and be paid' but work out of their home. However for those of us who can manage our business end of things we do not NEED all the extra stuff agencies offer and the expense it comes with to cover their own overhead is just to great an investment for services not needed. In other business model terms it is like some people want to open a 'Tim Hortons' franchise' because all the work is done for them and as a result they are willing to pay the high fee for that franchise support while others are passionate about baking and happy to be an independent donut shop. They too would be VERY resistant if the government came along and tried to tell them that some independent donut shops are shoddy and putting public at risk (because there are a few) and therefore to ensure that they catch those shoddy donut shops moving forward you must ALL convert and belong to a Tim Horton's Franchise if you want to sell donuts in Ontario! Fact is that even in the franchise model 'some locations' are shoddy – a license is not the answer it is changing what people VALUE as quality childcare and ensuring that both the service providers and the pubic demand that value in their service ;)

We need to protect CHOICE in childcare and to do that we need to support INDEPENDENT home childcare in a financially viable manner that ensures quality childcare to the public!

I sincerely hope that the current Ford government can find solutions that will both improve and support the needs of Ontario families in regards to choice in childcare while ensuring quality early learning for children!

Thank you for your time and consideration
Margaret Wake
RECE, AECEO.C
 

You only get one childhood. Let’s make sure it is full of magic, nature and discovery!