Why so many people leave the childcare sector?
Many childcare professionals only work in the childcare sector because they enjoy it and out of loyalty, Without this many childcare settings would not be where they are today.
With funding being cut in many areas of the childcare sector, there just isn’t the funds to pay childcare workers the amount they deserve. Providing children with high-quality care is the priority of all childcare settings, and without the dedicated, and passionate team members this can be hard to achieve. On many occasions, practitioners, and managers will work above and beyond their contracted hours to ensure children are receiving the best possible care. It is a shame when childcare settings cannot pay the staff the overtime as they just don’t have it within their budget.
It has been highlighted that many nursery managers are facing a recruitment crisis, recruiting qualification practitioners is becoming increasingly difficult due to low pay. It is suggested that more money should be invested into the childcare sector workforce from the government in order to keep nurseries open. Do you agree with this?
I qualified with NNEB in 1984..it was low paid then..but actually by comparision is much lower paid now!..ridiculous…i work on a bank staff basis for a medium sized nursery chain..they struggle to recuit qualified staff for this reason,also the increasingly anti social hours required to work..as the shifts are long..start early,&finish late..’wrap around care’ used to be covered by childminders,but increasingly nurseries are providing longer opening times to cater for this..also at the detriment of the workforce..whole thing needs an overhall.
Yes funding needs to be increased and the media need to stop the stories that nurseries over charge! Three babies a day @35 brings in £105 after basic wages to care for these babies leaves £26 per day to cover holiday pay, pensions, insurances, food, consumables, resources, rent, business rates etc. It’s not surprising nurseries are closing left right and centre and staff are leaving the proffession
I am a qualified early years practitioner with a BA hons degree in Early Childhood studies. I worked in the early years sector for 6 years after graduating. I loved my job but it always took more than it gave. Working long hours and many of them as unpaid overtime, relying on good will, took its toll. My monthly salary did not reflect the skills and knowledge required to fulfil my role. I made the difficult decision to leave the career that I spend four years studying and training for in December. I currently take home twice my previous salary, working only 3 days per week as a residential support worker.
As a manager of an early years setying I wholeheartedly agree. Over the last few years my setting has suffered quite a high turnover of staff. When I have asked staff why they are leaving 80% have said the same thing; they love the job and it’s a great place to work but the money is dreadful. I have tried numerous other ways to make conditions pleasent; although we run term time only staff can take term time holidays if they wish so they don’t have to pay iniquitous holiday hike prices, I am easy going about shift swaps etc… but none of this makes up for the appalling pay. Staff can earn better in Tescos with less responsibility. Good, well qualified staff are literally hens teeth. We have put wages up dramatically this year to (drum roll) £8.50 per hour for a qualifted early years practitioner with keyworker responsibilities. This could mark the end of the early years setting I work for but I am desperate to hold onto my current staff who are pure gold. I, myself, work above and beyond my contracted hours each week. If we have a child with a lot of additional needs in the setting the hours go up dramatically but the pay never does. I work 2 jobs 231/4 hours per week paid work as an early years manager and 21.25 hours at my second job as an out of hours club leader. Term time plus holidays. I earn £19500 per year which is about as much as it is possible to earn in our area. My wage can only go up if I move out of early years. My question is how many men would work 45 hours a week for £19500 and how qualified would they need to be? I have a degree and a PGCE. Although it is term time only I use up a lot of my holidays catching up on paperwork etc… I think the reason pay in the early years sector is so low is because it is largely staffed by women. We had to employ a gardener just to dig over a patch of weeds – that is all, no specialist knowledge, just a spade, he was the cheapest I could find at £12.50 per hour, £2 more per hour than I in my manager role.
Ive worked within early years for over 30 years ans although we have now got some good systems in place such as the EYFS i feel that there is a massive gap between Ofsted expectations and childcare/education training. The expectations are high whichvis good but the training seems to have very low benchmarks. The workload is can be very high. For instance where i work the majority of children are on the stretched funding which means practitioners can have up to 20 plus keychildren and have to complete 3 observations on every month. One staff generates 60 observations monthly alongside any SEND outcomes. On top of this they carry out additional daily tasks and the money is small for what they do. Many of my staff team have left to work in schools and i don’t blame them. Alot of the staff feel overwhelmed and i am constantly looking at new work practices that can lighten their load but still maintain quality care, teaching and learning. This is a hard task. Even as a manager most days are tiresome and most of my work is office based and less time is spent mentoring the staff. The government need to provide funding rates that match staff salaries. £5 an hour per child is not good enough if the majorityof children are funded. Practitioners sgould get at least £10 per hour considering the work and responsiblities that they have. If the pay is higher we would get more experiance staff abd wiyld not have to lower our expectations when recruiting. Some staff are completing NVQ’s, diplomas and degrees with no knowledge of the EYFS. This is ridiculous.
Just a handful of responses, clearly part of the problem? I totally agree with the above responses and would like to add that the deletion of local authority early years teacher roles and the cuts in funding have left us practitioners with greater responsibilities, particularly with regards to supporting children and carers with possible special educational needs. I say possible for children mostly arrive in our setting with no support in place they have often not had their 2 year check yet so we have to provide strategies for children with no outside support and begin the process of signposting parents and carers to get support and advice.
It feels like more and more responsibilities are put on our shoulders in the frontline but all for minimum wages and with no realistic routes for furthering our training and like the first comments, why would I fund a degree in early years to remain on the same wage?
No one seems to be backing our corner and protecting the passionate, hard working, creative, patient and reflective people that work in the early years sector.
I’ve worked in schools as a HLTA but only got paid a level 3 wage, however my genuine passion for teaching led me to accept this.
I now work in a preschool and paid minimum wage. I work tirelessly for the children and their families as well as going above and beyond for the company I work for, I’m a level 6 practitioner and paid minimum wage??? Why?? The cleaner works less hours than myself and earns more money as she’s paid £10 an hour!!!!!
I’m a single mum and work full time, I also study my BA Hons part time, I am also trying to set up a part time business with my friend. I cannot physically do anymore than I am yet it gets me nowhere 🙁
All our staff are on minimum wage except the deputy who only gets a slightly higher wage when the manager isn’t on the premises
I’m covering maternity leave of our manager and I get less than she did because the setting can’t afford her maternity pay/ me to have her wage and pay a new member of staff that has been taken on whilst she’s on maternity
This is our futut and passionate Childcarers have always done this job firstly because they enjoy it and want to make a difference and then obviously as employment but salaries are so far behind if u can’t make ends meet no matter how passionate you are about what you do you will eventually have to do something else. Like the text of the care sectors we do this job for dedication card and to make a difference it is about time we were recognised for this
Yes more needs to be done. I myself work in a Pre school, I have just completed my Level three in Children’s learning and development. As a result I had my contract reviewed and my pay adjusted accordingly. My pay rise is .47p per hour.
So I am now earning £7.97 per hour, .47p above the national living wage. I have considered doing further qualifications but would need to take a student loan, and I can’t even begin to justify getting in so much debt at my age for what would be a minimal financial gain.
A lot of people work in child care as it suits their life and fits around their own children, this is how I have come into the role. But no one appreciates the extra work that practitioners do outside of their settings. Planning and preparation. Courses that enable us to ensure the best care is given to the children we look after. Needless to say the consideration we have to put into child protection and safe guarding.
Many people think that we just play with children, when in fact we play and observe, we nurture and inspire. We wipe noses and tears, we get coughed on, and puked on, often we are hit and kicked. We are planning and watching and planning some more. We are monitoring the progress of the children in our care, we are ensuring the environment is safe and stimulating for them. We are ensuring parents and children are treated respectfully, that they are referred to appropriate services where needed.
We do so much for so little, and so many of us add to our settings resources with our own money.
I work for a charity run setting and so we do all our own fund raising each year for equipment etc, and we do all this in our own time too. We don’t get paid any extra. We attend meeting and committee meetings on our own time too.
So yes more needs to be done, so staff are paid appropriately, so that settings are properly covered for staff, and so that training can be ongoing and to the benefit of those undertaking it and to the place of their work. So that we can continue to offer a safe and nurturing environment.
Make practitioners feel valued, we love the job but it is not as easy as most people would assume.