The College of Early Childhood Educators (CECE) announced last week that they would be hiking the mandatory membership fee for Registered Early Childhood Educators by 9.4%. The Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care (OCBCC) joins our members across Ontario who have denounced the CECE’s fee increase and called for its reversal. 

The Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care is Ontario’s central advocacy group for a universal child care system with decent work and pay for Early Childhood Educators and child care staff. Our members include provincial organizations like the Association of Early Childhood Educators Ontario (AECEO) and provincial labour unions including the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), Elementary Teachers Federation of Ontario (ETFO), Ontario Secondary School Teachers Federation (OSSTF) and the Ontario Federation of Labour (OFL).

All of these OCBCC members have called for the CECE to reverse their fee increase - not to place additional financial burdens onto RECEs.

In their statement on the fee increase, the AECEO said that “College’s increased operating costs should not be downloaded to RECEs, who are already underpaid.”

ETFO stated that “DECEs are integral to the education of Ontario’s youngest learners and are among the lowest-paid educators in the province. As families across the province struggle to make ends meet, this increase is disappointing.”

In their call for the fee increase to be reversed, OSSTF noted the timing of the increase “during the quiet of the summer” and that “ECEs are some of the most important (& lowest-paid) workers”.

The OFL said that “Financial pressures faced by the College should not be downloaded to the frontline workers, many of whom are struggling to make ends meet and continue to work in the field that they love. We call on the College to reconsider their decision to raise annual registration fees and respect the workers they represent.”

CUPE’s Ontario School Board Council of Unions (OSBCU) has also called for the CECE “to find alternative ways to make up their budgetary needs, options that do not place further burden on ECEs.”

Since the creation of the CECE, Registered Early Childhood Educators have experienced a widening “professionalization gap” whereby the responsibilities and expectations of ECEs have increased but this has not been met by a commensurate improvement to wages and working conditions.

RECEs in Ontario’s full-day kindergarten, licensed child care and EarlyON systems are notoriously underpaid. Within the Canada-Wide Early Learning and Child Care system, RECEs have been ignored by the Ford government, whose bargain basement wage floor of $23.86 is an insult to the profession. Given the financial pressures already facing these educators it is unacceptable to place additional financial burdens on them of any kind. 

The current groundswell of concern from organizations across Ontario reflects the position of thousands of RECEs who have voiced their opposition to the fee increase via petitions, letters, calls and social media. Given the momentum of this opposition from across Ontario it is clear that the CECE has no option but to reverse their fee increase and seek other remedies to their budgetary shortfall.