Child Care Licensing Study, United States, 2011

The purpose of the 2011 Child Care Licensing Study is to report two aspects of child care licensing from 2011 for all 50 states and the District of Columbia (not including Idaho): (1) state child care licensing programs and policies and (2) child care center and family child care home licensing regulations. The study focuses on the processes and policies in each state related to staffing for the licensing program, monitoring facilities, and enforcement of licensing regulations.
To collect information on states' licensing policies, including staffing, monitoring, and enforcement of licensing regulations, the National Association for Regulatory Administration (NARA) disseminated the 2011 NARA Child Care Licensing Program Survey to all state child care licensing agencies in May 2012. Responses were received from all states. The survey focused on the processes and policies in each state related to staffing for the licensing program, monitoring facilities, and enforcement of licensing regulations. The data cover the following topical areas:

Number of licensed facilities
Complaint investigations
Licensing staff
Enforcement actions
Types of inspections
Licensing information on the Internet
Frequency of inspections
Licensing fees
Frequency of licensing
Licensing staff requirements
Inspections and monitoring and
Licensing's role in quality initiatives
The child care center licensing regulations used for this study are those that were posted on the National Resources Center for Health and Safety in Child Care (NRC) Web site. The data cover the following areas:

Licensing regulations
Additional staff training requirements
Definition of licensed child care centers
Child-staff ratios and group size
Staff roles and age requirements
Supervision of children
Staff qualifications and ongoing training requirements
Care of children
Facility requirements and
Staff hiring requirements
The same Web site was used to collect licensing regulations covering the above listed topics for small family child care homes and large/group family child care homes. More information on the study is located at the National Association for Regulatory Administration's Web site.