Even before the pandemic pushed the early childhood sector into crisis, California educators were paying a wage penalty for working with younger children, according to a new report from the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment (CSCCE) at the University of California at Berkeley.
Preschool teachers and child care workers earn 38% less than their colleagues in the K-8 system, the report says. This explains why 17% of early childhood educators live in poverty in California. That’s almost 7 times the poverty rate for the state’s K-8 teachers. Those are some key findings from the 2020 Early Childhood Workforce Index, a biennial report that tracks pay for early childhood jobs, the state poverty rate and a range of other workforce policies. All across the country, the research reveals, childcare workers often earn poverty wages.
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When public schools closed last March, Tanya García watched attendance at her busy Hollywood day care plunge. Some days, only one toddler came. But in recent months, Angelica’s Daycare has been busier than ever particularly among school-aged students.
“Two of them came to our day care, and the mom was like, ‘They’re so far behind right now, please help them with their ABCs,’” García said. “We literally had to become teachers.”
Indeed, preschool and day-care workers across the state say they have spent months managing ad hoc classrooms of older students tutoring, troubleshooting and teaching supplementary material while simultaneously caring for infants, toddlers and preschoolers. Officials could not say exactly how many of California’s 810,000 child-care seats were occupied by remote learners, but experts and educators say the numbers have surged.
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We wanted to know how close that prediction was to coming true almost a year later, so LAist requested the number of permanent and temporary closures, broken down by county, from the agency that licenses child care, the California Department of Social Services.
As of Jan. 25, 3,122 California child care providers had reported permanent shutdowns.
Child care has been a precarious business in recent years. L.A. County and the state as a whole have consistently lost child care slots since 2014. So far, the number of permanent closures between March of 2020 and January 2021 hasn t exceeded the number of closures from the previous year.
Children play at a family child care home in Oakland.
Credit: Michael Collier/EdSource Today
Children play at a family child care home in Oakland.
February 5, 2021
In response to the escalating child care crisis, one of many pressing social issues exacerbated by the pandemic, the new Biden administration has pledged to offer relief to child care providers struggling to stay open, as well as to help parents struggling to pay for child care.
Early childhood advocates cheer the relief package but also warn that deeper reform may be needed.
The core of Biden’s early childhood relief proposal involves a $40 billion pot of money, including $25 billion earmarked to stabilize the child care industry. The money would go toward helping providers pay for rent, utilities and payroll, as well as increased costs due to the pandemic, such as personal protective equipment and ventilation.