News & Stories: Ontario

Excerpt: "Ontario is making it easier for children and their families to access high quality early years programming and services with the launch of 100 new EarlyON Child and Family Centres across the province."

Excerpt: "Ontario is expanding culturally relevant licensed child care and early years programs, and investing in more child care spaces for First Nation, Métis and Inuit children and their families living in urban and rural areas across the province."

Excerpt: "For those young families with children, access to child care is also critically important. For mothers in particular, it means they can go back to work when they choose. Earlier this month, when we celebrated International Women's Day, we were reminded again that there is a long way to go to achieve gender equity. Only when we eliminate those barriers to child care will we get there. Thus far, your government has taken its first steps to make child care more accessible. The waitlist fees for child care have been eliminated, and a plan to help 100,000 more families access spots in child care is well underway. Subsidies are available for 60 per cent of all those new spaces, because they need to be an affordable choice for families. When children in Ontario turn four, they now have access to full-day kindergarten, which provides early, high-quality education to four and five-year-olds and huge savings for their families -- giving them a great start."

Excerpt: "Ontario is making an overall new investment of $2.2 billion over three years in child care, which includes over $930 million in 2020-21 to make licensed preschool child care free for kids from the age of 2.5 until they are eligible for kindergarten, beginning in September 2020. To support the expansion of quality, licensed child care, Ontario will also be introducing a wage grid for all program staff working in the early years and child care sector in April 2020 that will ensure their compensation is more closely aligned with Early Childhood Educators working in full-day kindergarten."

Excerpt: "Many parents today are trying to balance family and career challenges. We're helping families by making it easier to access good and affordable child care. We're helping with child care by: providing free preschool child care for kids aged two-and-a-half until they're eligible for kindergarten, starting September 2020; helping families access over 100,000 new child care spaces; increasing access to before- and after-school programs for kids up to age 12."

Excerpt: "Ontario is funding Canada's first dedicated care centre for fetuses requiring high-risk medical care and in-utero surgeries. The new Ontario Fetal Centre will support expectant families with increased access to world-renowned specialists and ground-breaking surgeries."

Excerpt: "Building more child care spaces and making child care more affordable will give parents, especially women, more choice about when and if they return to work, which will help close the gender wage gap and grow Ontario's economy."

Excerpt: "Growing Together: Ontario’s Early Years and Child Care Workforce Strategy is our plan to build a stronger, more robust workforce by recruiting and retaining more educators in the early years and child care sector. It is our plan to better care for the educators who care for our children. The strategy includes the following five initiatives to support educators: 1. Establishing fair compensation, 2. Improving working conditions, 3. Enhancing skills and opportunities, 4. Valuing contributions, 5. Increasing recruitment."

Excerpt: "Ontario's licensed child care sector continues to grow, driven by growth in licensed child care centres (see Figure 3 and Table 1). Specific areas of growth since 2008-09 include the following: The number of licensed child care centres increased by more than 15%, from 4,708 to 5,437. Licensed spaces have increased by 73%, from 246,642 to 427,032; The number of spaces has grown across all age groups, including kindergarten (280%), school age (90%), toddler (69%), infant (57%), and preschool (7%)."

Excerpt: "The proposed changes include: Increasing the number of young children that home-based child care providers can have in their care, from two under two-years-old, to three under two-years-old; Lowering the age at which home-based child care providers must count their own children towards the maximum allowable number of children in care, from six-years-old to four-years-old; Reducing the age requirement from six-years-old to four-years-old for authorized recreation programs that serve children after school; Removing the restriction that a parent must receive financial assistance before licensed in-home child care services can be provided for their child."

Excerpt: "Ontario will commit up to $1.0 billion over the next five years to create up to 30,000 childcare spaces in schools, including approximately 10,000 spaces in new schools. These school‐based childcare settings will provide safe learning environments for children and offer them the opportunity to grow in a familiar environment."

Excerpt: "Eligible staff working in a licensed child care program or agency will continue to see increased wages of up to $2 an hour, while home child care providers working with a licensed child care agency will be eligible for a grant of up to $20 a day. This investment will help strengthen Ontario's child care system by retaining more registered early childhood educators and other qualified professionals."