Child Care Services

Latest in Child Care Trends that Made an Impact in the US

The past few years have seen an increasing prevalence of day care centers in the US with parents, especially those who are working, preferring to leave their children in a state recognized child care center. These centers provide children under five years of age, an educational and fun environment while parents are at work or busy in some other engagements.  Owing to this, day care businesses is likely to have the fastest employment growth of all industries through 2020 as predicted by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. In fact, some of the recent researches indicate that child care centers that are able to create an emotionally supportive and developmentally sound atmosphere hold a positive effect on the complete family. Since, children are in the company of their peers, they learn better & faster, develop their social skills by making new friends and catch up on the cognitive & language skills rather fast.

Tracing the Evolution of Child Care Centers

During the late 1990’s, a lot of mothers entered the workforce after passing of Clinton administration’s welfare-to-work program. This was the first time when limited availability of day care centers became a reason for stress among the working parents as they had no safe alternative to leave their children when they were at work.  In fact, even the employers realized about this barrier and thought of providing child care centers in or near the office as a worthwhile investment for keeping their qualified workers. Since then, there has been a substantial growth in the number of day care centers, however the steady demand is yet to be fulfilled completely.

According to new data from Sageworks, child day care businesses in the U.S. have consistently grown sales in recent years, even as many other industries struggled in the economic recession and subsequent recovery.

Today, a substantial number of children spend their time in a day care center or home-based child care. However, there is no definite evidence that whether a child care is actually beneficial or worse for a child as compared to being cared for by a parent.

Understanding the Demographics for Child Care Centers

The target market includes working parents (both single & married) and also unmarried partner households. According to the 2006 ThirdWave Research report, the total potential market for daycare centers, nursery and preschools was $24.7 billion. If we talk about the age range, 25-44 year olds represent 82% of the market while those in the age group of 45-54 years constitute a 10.77% share. Under 25 and over 55 year old represent 7.33%. Income brackets also have a role to play in choosing the services of a child care center. Parents earning between $50,000 & $99,000 constitute 42.93% while those earning above $100,000 form 32.46% of the center care programs. 71.94% White people have opted for a child care program while 12.23% of the Non-Hispanic community is part of the child care market.

Underlining the Concerns for Opting for a Child Care Center

No matter how alluring the thought of a child in a day care center might be, parents are always a bit apprehensive about leaving their little ones with a stranger. To ease parents a little bit child care centers should be more transparent about their structure, activities and the way they conduct themselves. Owners of child day care services must also focus on industry regulations as they are subject to constant scrutiny from government agencies. For instance, in Arkansas, authorities are proposing changes in guidelines for child care providers to cover a host of issues ranging from safety to staff to children ratio and psychological behavioral charts.

Latest developments in technology have also contributed to better scrutiny by parents as some of the specialized apps help them to keep a check on the activities of the child. Some apps allow parents to cyber visit their child’s day care room via the internet at any time of the day.

Child care centers these days concentrate on the holistic development of children, taking care of all their needs- from food to learning and recreation. We recommend Quapaw House Child Care Services. Visit http://quapawhouseinc.org/ for further details.