ExchangeEveryDay Past Issues

Pay for teachers in a daycare situation are not what they should be. Besides pay issues, is the teacher-child ratio. I've heard teachers complain about both issues. Whoever is responsible for instituting both issues should be made to work in athis type of environment to see the impact for themselves.

I am a new director at non-profit day care center. One of my biggest challenges has been hiring new staff, and motivating the staff that I have to do what is DAP in their classrooms. We definately could offer more $ per hour and benefits unfortunately is not even opptional, but we do offer sick days, paid holidays, paid vacation and TEACH an area program to help staff earn a CDA or an associates degree. It is been so frustrating--we have had to turn families away because our enrollment is at it's limit with our current number of staff. Most phone calls I recieve from ads are from indivuduals who have no experience or who have degree's in other job areas and think they should still be earning a wage comparable to where they were before or we get no response at all.
Frustrated!

Yes, pay and benefits have been an issue for the 20+ years I have been in the field. In fact, the only reason I survived my first few years in the field is that my first employer saw fit to offer full medical and dental benefits to ALL employees (even part time). This one reason was the deciding factor when I considered other professions and opportunities.

As I gained the requisite education and experience in the field, I was able to work my way up to the higher-paying and full-time positions which traditionally include benefits. If the part-time benefit had not been there when I was an aide and part-time teacher, I'm sure that I would have found another job elsewhere, in another field.

Sadly, shortly after I left the first company, they stopped offering benefits to part-time employees. The high cost of health-care caught up with them.

As a supervisor, it is especially frustrating to try and run an appropriate and engaging curriculum with a revolving cast of teachers and aides.

I have been in my current coordinator position for 2 years and 6 months. Only one staff member remains from when I began (not surprisingly, it is the one staff member who receives partial benefits and is allowed to work a nearly full-time schedule).

In my 30 months in this position, we have been through 7 teachers and 8 aides. Averaged out, we lose roughly one staff member every two months. What is frightening is that, as I look at other sites in our organization, and at other local sites, our numbers are pretty darn good in comparison.

We've lost staff mostly to retail operations, although some have left to attend college (which happens traditionally).

One can correctly guess the impact on our curriculum, some of which is mandated by the state.

Our organization recently completed a wage/benefit survey and found that we were not out of line with the average and median for our area, in terms of child care professionals. In fact, for some positions we were at or near the top of the scale.

I believe that in order to attract and retain the most qualified and desirable employees, something must be done about the cost of benefits. I also believe that the field in general must raise its perception of professionalism in the community/state/nation at large- and use that perception to demand higher wages and command better-qualified employees.

I agree with Cheryl Young. And I would add that the shortage of qulaified teachers is likely impacted by the wages.

WE HAVE FOUND THE SAME PROBLEMS HERE IN THE DAVIS COUNTY AREA ALSO. THE BIG PROBLEM IS THE HOURLY WAGES AND NOT BEING ABLE TO OFFER BENEFITS. WE ARE COMPETITION WITH WALMART, MCDONALDS ETC. CHILDCARE STAFF DESERVE TO BE PAID MORE. AS A DIRECTOR/OWNER FOR TWENTY YEARS, THIS IS PROBABLY THE WORST IT HAS GOT FOR US.