The number of children a care giver supervises can directly affect the quality of your child's care. For this reason, every state mandates staff-to-child ratios. This ratio must be maintained for the facility or family provider's home to become, and remain, licensed. Daycare center staff ratios are based on age groups. The younger the group, the lower the ratio. However, you can't always increase the number of children allowed in a group by simply adding more and more caregivers. Generally, you could double the number of children, but not triple the number, because there's a maximum number of children allowed per group. Family daycare providers must maintain different ratios than daycare centers. The ratio varies depending on the number of the provider's own children, as well as the number of client children from the same household. Family daycares have lower ratios, mandated by state regulations, due to varying ages of the children, the lack of a commercial kitchen, and fewer bathroom facilities.
