Unionization and quality in early childhood programs

Excerpt

This CUPE-commissioned study by two leading academics indicates that unionization not only has a positive impact on child care workers, but also on children in unionized centres, their parents and society. In other words, unionization of child care workers is good public policy. Specifically, the study found that:

• Wages and benefits for teaching staff are substantially better in unionized centres. 
• Turnover rates for teachers are lower in unionized centres.
• A significantly higher proportion of unionized centres act in ways that predict or are associated with higher levels of quality.
• Unionized centres score higher on an overall program quality measurement than non-unionized centres.