SURVEY: Four in five child care centers in the U.S. are understaffed  

Respondents said federal funds are essential to a full recovery from the pandemic 

WASHINGTON (July 27, 2021)—Child care providers across the country are struggling to fill essential staff roles and maintain financial stability according to a new survey of 7,500 early childhood educators from the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), a leading advocate for high-quality early childhood education. The survey illuminates a major obstacle to working families as the U.S. recovers economically from the COVID-19 pandemic. 

“So many child care programs are facing the same problems,” said NAEYC CEO Rhian Evans Allvin. “Federal relief funds have helped programs weather the worst of the pandemic, but they haven’t fixed the underlying economic conditions in early childhood education that led to the crisis in the first place and which led to the closure of thousands of programs.  This is the moment to address those issues so that early childhood education is on sound footing for decades to come.”  

Among the survey’s key findings:  

• Four out of every five respondents from child care centers said that they had a staffing shortage, and 15 percent reported a “major shortage” of 6-15 fewer workers than needed. 
• 78 percent of respondents identified low wages as the main obstacle to recruitment of educators, and 81 percent said that insufficient pay is the main reason educators leave the field. 
• More than one in every three respondents said they were considering leaving or shutting down their child care programs this year; this percentage increases for minority-owned programs, more than half of whom are considering permanent closure. 
• In the context of programs facing staffing challenges and parents facing ongoing pandemic uncertainty, programs that are open are operating at an average enrollment rate of 71% of their licensed capacity, with 48% of enrolled children attending on an average day. 

Respondents said federal assistance from the Paycheck Protection Program and child care relief funds have been crucial, and they predicted that increased federal funding would help to address current staffing struggles and keep programs open and operating, providing parents with quality options in all program settings that help them stay in or rejoin the workforce: 

• 46 percent of respondents—and 54 percent of minority-owned programs—would have closed during the pandemic without federal assistance. 
• 63 percent of educators working in child care programs saw an increase in compensation from relief funds, and 53 percent of family child care programs anticipate using funds to pay off debt incurred during the pandemic. 

“As state and federal policymakers look to rebuild these essential programs, they must build on relief and look toward sustainable, substantial funding that helps families have quality choices, which includes providing early childhood educators with professional salaries,” said Evans Allvin. “That is how we make sure that our children and economy can thrive.” 

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Survey Methodology: This survey was created and conducted by NAEYC using SurveyMonkey and represents the responses of a non-randomized sample of 7,518 individuals working in early childhood education settings who completed the survey in English or Spanish between June 17 - July 5, 2021. The respondents represent providers in 50 states as well as Washington, DC, and Puerto Rico; 29% report that they work in family child care homes while 51% report that they work in center-based child care. Others work in public school PreK and Head Start. The survey links were shared widely through email newsletters, listservs, social media, and via partnerships, and 10 randomly selected respondents were provided with a $50 gift card for participation in a sweepstakes. Given the constantly changing and widely varying nature of the crisis, the analysis from this survey is intended to present the experiences of the respondents, as captured in the moment that they take the survey, with extrapolations for the experiences of the field and industry at large. 

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The National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) is a professional membership organization that works to promote high-quality early learning for all young children, birth through age 8, by connecting early childhood practice, policy, and research. We advance a diverse, dynamic early childhood profession and support all who care for, educate, and work on behalf of young children. The association comprises nearly 60,000 individual members of the early childhood community and more than 50 Affiliates, all committed to delivering on the promise of high-quality early learning. Together, we work to achieve a collective vision: that all young children thrive and learn in a society dedicated to ensuring they reach their full potential. 

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