Since 2013 there has been a legal right to care for children between one and three years old. How has this affected educators and childminders? The Federal Statistical Office did the math.
Over the past ten years, the number of childcare workers has grown faster than the number of children cared for. As the Federal Statistical Office announced, around 702,200 teachers worked in daycare centers as of March 1, 2023. In 2013 – when the legal right to care for one to three-year-old children came into force – there were only 465,000 people. The number increased by 51 percent.
The number of children cared for in day care centers only increased by 22 percent in the same period: from 3.21 million in 2013 to 3.93 million in 2023. “The increase is primarily due to the expansion of care for under three-year-olds “The statisticians in Wiesbaden reported: 721,600 children under the age of three were recently looked after in day care centers, which was 43 percent more than ten years previously.
Lots of part-time workers
Why is the staffing situation in many daycare centers still considered tense? “This is due, among other things, to the greater increase in the number of under-three-year-olds in care, who need more intensive care than older children,” explained the statisticians. In 2022, in groups with children under the age of three, there were an average of four children per carer. In groups from three years up to school entry there were almost twice as many.
“Another reason for the personnel shortage of many daycare centers is likely to be that the proportion of full-time daycare workers is comparatively low,” added the statisticians: Two thirds of the daycare center teaching staff in 2023 worked part-time.
Fewer childminders look after more children
Instead of going to a daycare center, some parents prefer to give their children to a childminder or, in rare cases, to a childminder. The childcare ratio here has changed significantly over the past ten years.
In 2023, around 41,200 childminders and fathers worked in day care, six percent fewer than in 2013. At the same time, the number of children cared for by publicly funded childminders increased by 19 percent to 166,700.
Lots of boys, more men
According to the Federal Office, the people working in daycare centers are comparatively young. A good 40 percent of them were younger than 35 years old in March 2023. This means that the staff is younger than the average workforce. In 2022, around 53,100 people completed training in the three most common educational occupations: as an educator, social assistant or childcare worker.
“Significantly more women than men complete training in the above-mentioned educational professions,” reported the Federal Office. “However, the proportion of men has increased over the past ten years.” The proportion of men in the three training occupations rose from almost 14 percent in 2012 to almost 18 percent in 2022.
Recognition rare
In addition to these qualifications, there are those that were acquired abroad and recognized in Germany. But that’s difficult, as a comparison of the numbers shows. There were only 2,232 procedures for the recognition of a foreign professional qualification as an educator in 2022. And of these, only 1,509 were approved. According to statistics, the qualification as an educator is still “among the top 10 in the ranking of professions with the most recognition procedures for foreign qualifications”.
