Australia

There is definitely a difference between the care if an infant and toddler and a preschooler. Preschool children have all their bathroom needs under control, and can listen and do. Their play is much more manageable than an infant or a toddler.

It takes a special person to do infant and toddler care, and there are many women who do. The fact is, most women who love caring for infants and toddlers, no matter who they belong to, are not going to have early childhood degrees. As soon as you place a degree in someones hand, they are not going to want to spend that degree there; they are going to want to teach, and infants need a different kind of care.

When the state doesn't understand this, and requires all its child care workers to have college degrees, there will (duh) be a shortage of infant and toddler providers. Upgrading does not necessarily mean a degree. It means experience.

Judy

From Monsters and Critics.com
Asia-Pacific News
Sydney, Australia UPI

Aussie Day Care Turning Away Toddlers

Day-care centers in Australia have been rejecting toddlers because they cost too much to care for.

The Australian reports that generally the centers must have one staff member for each five children under the age of 3, while the ratio is one to eight for 3- to 6-year-olds. The regulations vary slightly in different states.

ABC Learning Centers told officials that government subsidies should be higher for younger children.

Day-care centers also report a shortage of space. Sally Anderson, a longtime employee at the Clovelly Child Care Center in the suburbs of Sydney, said that there are 700 names on the waiting list, more than half of them infants or toddlers.