Child Care Resource provides child care statistics for the Chittenden County community. The statistics reported on the pages below are the ones most typically requested. If you have a question and you can’t find the answer below, please feel free to contact us.

Regulated Child Care Programs:

• Number, Capacity, Vacancies
• Demand
• Average Tuition
• Quality Recognition

Child Care Wages and Benefits: 

• Child Care Resource Child Care Wages and Benefits Study – October 2011
• Child Care Resource Child Care Wages and Benefits Study – August 2006
• US Bureau of Labor Statistics - Preschool Teacher and Child Care Worker Wages:
  May 2009 and May 2010.

Number, Capacity, and Vacancies

July 2012

During the typical week, approximately 6,800 children ages birth through 12 attend a regulated child care program in Chittenden County. 

Source: Child Care Resource Provider Database

Demand:

Care for Infants and Toddlers is the most difficult to find:

Most commonly, families find child care through word of mouth. When that doesn’t work, families call Child Care Resource. We assist an average of 2,000 Chittenden County families per yet in finding child care either on-line, by phone, or in person.

While only 23% of children in Chittenden County are ages birth to two, 63% of child care searches are for this age group, demonstrating the difficulty in finding child care for infants and toddlers. In addition, 75% of parents who call multiple times for referrals are parents of children in this age group.

Child Care Searches By Age of Child: July 2011 - June 2012

Average Program Tuition: April 2011

The average tuition amounts below are for programs offering a weekly full-time care. For after school programs, this means care from school dismissal to 5:30 or 6:00 pm.

Tuition is not necessarily equal to cost. Some programs have additional sources of income that supplement tuition.

Some community-based early care and education programs have formed partnerships with local school districts to provide publicly funded pre-kindergarten education for children ages 3-5 years.  These public education funding helps to cover the cost of 10 hours per week for 35 weeks per year.  In some cases the funding is used to reduce the tuition that parents pay. In Chittenden County, there are 36 currently in partnership with one or more school district. Of these, 28 are centers or private preschool programs and 8 are family child care programs.

Programs Recognized for High Quality

July 2012

Programs may be recognized for quality through national organizations such as the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) or the National Association of Family Child Care (NAFCC). They may also be recognized for quality through the State of Vermont Step Ahead to Recognition System (STARS).

In the table below, high quality is defined as accreditation through NAEYC or NAFCC or attainment of 4 STARS or 5 STARS through the State of Vermont.

• Preschool programs are most likely to have attained a high level of quality recognition.
• Regardless of the type of program, across the board, vacancy rates in programs recognized for high quality are much lower than overall vacancy rates in programs in regulated programs.

 Source: Child Care Resource Provider Database

Bureau of Labor Statistics - Occupational Employment Survey: Preschool Teachers and Child Care Providers

Below is the most recent information we have from the Bureau of Labor Statistics about wages for Vermont preschool teachers and child care workers. Included is a comparison of data from May of 2009 with May of 2010.

These data come from the Occupational Employment Survey or OES.  The OES survey is a semiannual mail survey of nonfarm establishments. The BLS produces the survey materials and selects the establishments to be surveyed. The sampling frame (the list from which establishments to be surveyed are selected) is derived from the list of establishments maintained by State Workforce Agencies (SWAs) for unemployment insurance purposes. Establishments to be surveyed are selected in order to obtain data from every metropolitan and nonmetropolitan area in every State, across all surveyed industries, and from establishments of varying sizes. The SWAs mail the survey materials to the selected establishments and make follow-up calls to request data from nonrespondents or to clarify data. The collected data are used to produce occupational estimates at the National, State, and sub-State levels.  For more information about OES click here: http://www.bls.gov/oes/#faq.