Dortmund's daycare centers in need: Parents complain of lack of staff and closures!

Dortmund's daycare centers in need: Parents complain of lack of staff and closures!

In Dortmund, the lack of personnel in the daycare centers has become a serious challenge for parents. Many of them report closed groups and greatly reduced opening times, which not only makes it difficult for the everyday life of families, but also ensures considerable despair. According to Ruhr Nachrichten are afraid of the development of their children and would like to remain anonymous to avoid possible consequences. A survey among parents shows that more and more professional loss of work can be attributed to the Situation in the daycare centers.

The effects of the lack of personnel are serious. Parents like Alex Liefermann and his partner often have to learn that their children cannot be looked after. Your son Liam stays at home for at least two days a week. This has immediate financial consequences: Liefer, freelancer in the media industry, is forced to cancel orders, which brings him to a monthly loss of 300 to 500 euros. Other parents, such as Danny Eggert and Christin Dieckhöfer, are also under pressure because they have to pay attention to an emergency care place every day in order to be able to fulfill their labor obligations. Tagesschau reports that this situation has become intolerable for many.

worrying developments

Darkness over the daycare centers seems to be condensed further. According to a comprehensive survey of 5,387 kitals in Germany, which was carried out as part of the dklk-Study 2023 , around 10,000 daycare centers worked more than half of the time Personnel underlay. This represents a troubling increase compared to previous years; The number of facilities concerned is two and a half times as high as 2021.

Almost 95% of the city leaders state that the lack of personnel has intensified in the past 12 months, which has negative effects on pedagogical quality. So many daycare centers have to be omitted in support and education. Over 80% of the kitals also report dissatisfaction among the employees, and a quarter records cancellations of employees due to the desolate conditions.

The search for solutions

Solutions are urgently sought. Michael Schmidt, CEO of Diakonie Düsseldorf, emphasizes that the training as an educator lasts three years. Therefore, the gap in specialists is difficult to close at short notice. Schmidt suggests temporarily reducing the staff standards in order to use experienced nannies. In Lower Saxony there are already draft laws that should make it possible to have experienced educational forces work in childcare groups without three years of training.

At the federal level, Federal Minister of Family Affairs Lisa Paus presented a strategy paper that aims to win up to 90,000 new educators. This includes a financed three -year retraining and the recruitment of foreign specialists. In addition to the structural changes, however, parents and delivery managers also require concrete measures to relieve families.

The situation is tense and it remains to be seen which measures are taken in the short and long term to remedy the pressing lack of specialists in daycare centers and thus ensure advantageous conditions for early childhood education.