Ontario’s early learning and child care sector is undergoing a period of huge transformation. At the Coalition, we want to ensure that the child care community is as informed as possible throughout this process. Below you’ll find our response paper, summaries of the consultation process, as well as information put out by the Ministry. On June 27, Minister Broten released a discussion paper on “Modernizing Child Care in Ontario”.

To read the Coalition's response paper, Child Care Modernization: Doing it right, please click here.

For a one page summary, please click here. (produced by the OCBCC). For the questions, please click here (produced by the OCBCC). For the discussion paper in English, please click here. For the discussion paper in French, please click here.

Community responses to “Modernizing Child Care”

Ontario New Democratic Party, Education Critic Peter Tabuns

CUPE Ontario: A Call for Transformation, Not Tinkering  

Modernizing Child Care in Ontario,  City of Toronto Response to the Provincial Discussion Paper

Andrew Fleck Child Care Services response

Andrew Fleck Child Care Services response with regards to Home Child Care

A Child Care System for Today and Tomorrow - from the YWCA

Response from the Association of Early Childhood Educators Ontario

Today's Family Early Learning and Child Care's Response

Macaulay Child Development Centre response.

Response from Family Day Care Services

Response from the Home Child Care Association of Ontario

Response from Jackman Child Care

Response from CUPE Local 79

Response from the Canadian Federation of University Women Ontario Council

Atkinson Centre –  Modernizing Child Care - Questions to answer: more to ask

The Atkinson Letter
Summary:

1)       Funding:

• Direct new funding to younger children under a streamlined funding formula
• For 2012 funding should be expedited under the existing models to stabilize programs as they transition, but that moving forward, a streamlined funding model based on base funding similar to that of the rest of the education sector is essential.

2)       Systems Management

• Give regional systems managers authority to rationalize service delivery
• Devolve child care licensing to regional systems managers
• Include Ontario Early Years Centres (OEYCs) and Parent and Family Literacy Centres (PFLCs) and Data Analysis Coordinators (DACs) in regional planning and oversight

3)       Enhancing Quality

• Adopt a province-wide quality assessment tool
• Reform age groupings to reflect new realities
• Develop leadership in the early years sector
• Adopt ELECT as the common curriculum framework in all early childhood settings

YMCA – For Ontario’s Children: Building an integrated & efficient early learning & child care system
To read the full list of recommendations put forward by the YMCA, click here.

Some points of note:

• Align the DNA with the Education Act to allow child care providers to use all available student-use spaces in a school.
• Explore opportunities to harmonize the ratio of staff to children aged four and five years old under the DNA of 1:10 with the Education Act ratio of 1:13.
• Ministry of Education adopt a whole-of-government approach and work with the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services to update the Ontario Fire Code Guidelines with respect to the different guidelines and requirements for school board operated facilities and child care centres.
• Ministry of Education should  increase flexibility for Director’s Approval  to include Child and Youth Workers, Recreation Skills Leadership, and Certified Ontario Teachers for school-age programs (6-12 year olds)
• Ministry should  expand the requirement for on-site supervisor to include ECEs who may have less than two years of experience working in a day nursery but years of experience working with children in a different setting
• Ministry of Education should strengthen the Child Care Sector by extending the Mixed-Age Groupings to more than the currently allowable limit of one room per site
• Licensed home child care: current regulatory regime should be modernized to allow no more than seven children, including the provider’s children, to be in a home for a maximum of 30 minutes to allow for children to arrive while others are leaving for school and/or home.