Survey Finds Day Care Providers Worried About Safety, Futures

We’ve been hearing for weeks about the COVID-19 fears facing day care providers.

A new statewide survey—2,100 responded—puts numbers on those nightmares.

Forty-four percent of the smaller family day care homes reported high levels of stress.

That number jumped to 69 percent among the larger day care centers.

Ninety-three percent of those larger day care centers are concerned that families will drop-off children who are sick—raising questions about personal and professional survival.

“Less than 25 percent thought they were going to survive a closer of from two to four weeks,” says Kate Gallagher, Director of Research and Development for the Buffett Early Childhood Institute, which conducted the survey.

NCN: If day care providers can’t operate what happens to those families that need day care?

Kate Gallagher: We had a shortage of child care slots in Nebraska…If programs close I can’t imagine how the shortages are going to impact the economic well-being of communities overall.

One short-term protection plan resulting from the survey finds a call for day care providers to receive more COVID-19 testing, thermometers, masks and cleaning supplies.