Choosing the Right Daycare Center for Your Child

How to Decide Between the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly when it Comes to Daycare Centers

Since time began, traditional family roles have placed the bulk of child rearing on the mothers and the bulk of the financial responsibility on the fathers. The 1960s proved to be an empowering time in the lives of women with the passing of the Equal Pay Act by Congress in 1963 that promised comparable wages for the same work regardless of race, religion or sex of the worker and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act passed in 1964 that prohibited discrimination on the basis of race, religion, or sex. Millions of women flocked to the work force in the following years.

In 2002, 55 percent of mothers with infant children were in the workforce. Two million preschoolers were being cared for in more than 650,000 daycare centers in the United States in 2002 while their mothers worked. Since children who are enrolled in a daycare center spend approximately 50 hours each week in the center, it’s important that parents research the centers thoroughly to ensure the best possible experience for the child and for themselves. There are many ways parents can do this. It’s not hard to weed out the bad ones, if they know what to look for. The following information will explain how to spot common red flags when choosing a child care center.

Educate yourself

Be armed with information before you visit prospective centers. Know the state guidelines for centers in your state so that you can ask the right questions.
Know what the legal teacher/child ratio is for your child’s age group is so that you can compare it to the actual classes in the centers you interview. You can also call your local childcare licensing office to find out if they have a website. There, you can search each center by name to see if any violations have been found during state inspections. The severity of the violations (Minor ones being paperwork infractions; Major ones being accidents) is a good indicator of how the center is ran. There is a website that contains licensing and teacher/child ratio information as well as contact information for the licensing offices broken down by state at www.daycare.com

Don’t announce your visit to the center