By Ivelisse Martinez-Beck, Ph.D., Senior Social Science Research Analyst and Child Care Research Team Leader, Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation
Some 129,000 center-based early care and education (ECE) programs served approximately 6.98 million children from birth to age five years who are not yet in kindergarten in 2012. Our new report from the National Survey of Early Care and Education (NSECE) offers the first portrait of these early childhood programs in more than 20 years.
Findings include:
- 22 percent of center-based ECE programs serve 25 children or less and 32 percent of programs serve more than 75 children
- 25 percent of programs serve children age birth to five years
- 30 percent of programs serve only children age three to five years
- 27 percent of programs serve children age birth to school-age
- 52 percent of programs are not-for-profit organizations, 32 percent are for-profit, and 16 percent are run by government agencies
- 68 percent of programs receive tuition from parents and 73 percent receive some public funding from state, local or federal government
- 55 percent of children attend center-based programs that are not sponsored by a public school district, and do not receive Head Start or public pre-K funds
- 30 percent of programs are predominantly publicly funded, and another 43 percent have at least some public revenues
- 27 percent of programs provide less than 30 hours per week of care, with programs serving infants and toddlers more likely to operate at least 30 hours weekly
The source of these findings, National Survey of Early Care and Education , is a set of four integrated, nationally representative surveys conducted in 2012 and designed to describe the current landscape of early care and education in this country, as well as household’s utilization and preferences regarding non-parental care for young children. Sign up for our newsletter to receive the latest on the survey and our other work on early care and education.