Francophone daycares in Ontario are struggling to recruit educators, so much so that nearly one in two Franco-Ontarians may never have access to daycare services in their language before entering school, deplores the Francophone Association Education Services for Children in Ontario (AFESEO). An important first step towards the use of French at school and at home, experts believe.
“Our waiting lists are growing significantly,” says Arnaud Claude, general director of Compagnons des francs-loisirs, from North Bay. Parents in this northeastern Ontario city will have to wait “years” to secure a place for their child in one of their eight establishments. “If we continue like this, there are people who sign up and who, unfortunately, will not be able to have a place in daycare until the child is old enough to go to school. »
Opened in 1982, the French-speaking daycare is forced to operate at 70% of its capacity due to the lack of qualified educators, who are “leaving the profession with great fanfare”. In Ontario, the Child Care and Early Years Act requires that at least one qualified educator be present in every classroom.
But working conditions do not make it possible to attract or retain these workers, estimates AFESEO. Already difficult, they “deteriorated” with the pandemic, explains the general director of the association, Martine St-Onge. Due to lack of staff, the occupancy rate in French-speaking daycares in Ontario “was hovering around 67 %” in 2021-2022, according to a study commissioned by AFESEO. Today, “it’s perhaps even worse,” assures M.me St-Onge.
According to her, the difficulty of the sector does not spare English-speaking daycares. “The retention problem is everywhere. » It remains that in Ontario, the French-speaking labor pool is smaller, since 3.4% of the Ontario population has French as their only first official language spoken, according to the 2021 census.
The general director of the Croque-soleil daycare, in Kingston, understands the importance of offering good working conditions. In 2021, Audrey Adam almost had to close the doors of her establishment due to the lack of qualified staff. “We were missing so many people, things were going badly,” she says on the phone.
But by increasing salaries and becoming “more flexible on leave requests,” the daycare was able to improve its employee retention. However, it remains difficult for parents in the region to obtain a place in the establishment. More than 50 families are on the waiting list for each daycare program. “We can only take 20 per year […] Very often, they will not have space because we have limited capacities. »
A “gateway to the French-speaking world”
However, daycare is very important in a child’s educational journey. According to an inter-university study published in the journal Plos Oneit is possible to “predict at a good level the performance” of a student in primary school from the end of the preschool period.
“Attendance in quality childcare settings […] is associated with better performance, better knowledge, particularly literacy,” indicates Michel Boivin, professor at the School of Psychology at Laval University, referring to a previous study.
“We must avoid falling into absolute determinism,” he adds, because children can fill in their gaps “once they get to school.” But in minority language areas, “rich” childcare environments are important to “compensate for less exposure to French”.
“For Francophones, any lost place has an impact on the vitality of our community, on registration in French-language schools, then in French-speaking post-secondary education,” agrees Martine St-Onge. It is the gateway to the French-speaking world. »
“Loss of culture”
Turning to the English-speaking system due to the lack of places should not, however, harm the child’s language development, as long as they are not at risk of neurodevelopmental disorders and they remain exposed to French, reassures the professor of pediatric neuropsychology at the University of Montreal Anne Gallagher.
The issue is more on a “family” level, according to the member of the CHU Sainte-Justine Research Center. Often, a child who grows up in a bilingual environment will associate the spoken language with “school or daycare.” […] to his friends, to his social life, to his autonomy. So at home, he will no longer want to speak much of the language that is not spoken at daycare,” which can sometimes cause “family friction.” “It can affect all children, whether they develop normally or not. »
More and more young English speakers
Constrained by the lack of places or interested in learning French, more and more English-speaking parents are enrolling their children in French-speaking daycares, testify Mr. Claude and M.me Adam.
Arnaud Claude recognizes an “interest” in this, but sees in this surge of English-speaking inscriptions a sort of “despair”. “I also believe that it is simply families who are also stuck in their English daycares where there are no places who say to themselves “maybe we will have better luck”. »
If English speakers are welcome in both establishments, management assures that “French speakers will always have priority”.
This report is supported by the Local Journalism Initiative, funded by the Government of Canada.