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Human Resources Issues

Human resources (HR) issues encompass everything about hiring, retaining, and training employees. Child Care Regulation (CCR) under the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) governs many aspects of HR issues. Is your childcare business compliant?

     
 
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 Hiring Childcare Workers for Your Business

To maintain compliance with regulations, all your employees must meet basic qualifications for working in a childcare facility or providing care for children. One of the best resources for finding employees for your business is through Workforce Employment Services, run by the same Workforce Board you connect with to become a CCS Provider.

When looking for employees for your childcare business, they must have the following minimum qualifications based on their role and contact with children.

Get Tips for Attracting Staff from Texas Workforce Commission

The Texas Workforce Commission (TWC) produced a video series for childcare providers with tips on attracting and retaining staff. Each 10- to 20-minute video contains information on one of the aspects of the processes of hiring and managing employees.

For example, the first video on recruitment tips and tools covers the basic elements of a job posting announcement: why someone should work for you, what skills and qualities they need, and how they apply.

Use these tips when posting your childcare business job openings on Work in Texas to maximize the number of candidates who apply.

Post Your Job Openings on Work in Texas

One of the most useful resources for listing your childcare business job openings is Work in Texas. Texas Workforce Commission local boards use this site to help partner people in need of work with jobs they qualify for.

To get the most response from your listing, make sure to include a complete, detailed, and accurate posting that has the following element:

  • Duties and responsibilities for the position
  • Type and length of required experience for the position
  • Type of education or training required for the position

For childcare providers, experience and education are important to ensuring that you can find qualified workers. However, as an employer, you can also upskill new hires by providing them with needed training for the position you hired them for.

To make your listing even more effective at attracting talent, include optional information, such as:

  • Annual salary or hourly pay rate
  • Required or desired computer or office skills, such as using a tablet for taking childcare attendance
  • Clear instructions on how to apply for the job
  • Whether the applicant must have a license or certification
  • Specific things job applicants should know about working at your childcare business
Post Staff Openings on University and College Job Boards and Career Fairs

You need to have people with at least a high-school education or higher, so, don’t neglect job boards for area schools. The following are some universities and colleges in the Gulf Coast area that have online job boards you can post your childcare openings to:

Online Job Sites

Don’t forget the ease of posting jobs online. With the following online sites, you can quickly post your openings and review resumes from potential hires. A few of the online sources to consider are:

  • Acquire 4 Hire: This job posting site caters specifically to the needs of companies that have multiple locations or special needs, such as franchises, business networks, non-profits, and cooperatives. For childcare centers operating within non-profits, such as those in churches, this might be an option for finding new employees.
  • Indeed: Indeed claims to have 57 million job posting viewers on its site each month. If you choose this site to post, you can reach a very large audience due to its popularity. Posting a job on Indeed is free, but because the site is so large, it encourages employers to sponsor their postings for better visibility. Sponsorships start at a price of $5 per day..
  • ZipRecruiter: Another large general job recruitment site online is ZipRecruiter. Like Indeed, you can post your jobs on this site and sort through applicants from your phone or computer. You will have to pay for a plan to post jobs, but you can try a free trial of the plan before you have to pay.  
  • LinkedIn: Like Indeed, you can post jobs for free on LinkedIn, with the option of paying for it to have better visibility. This site also gives you the option of having AI help you to write your job posting.
  • Social Media: Let your contacts know that you have openings in your childcare business. If you have business pages on social media sites as part of your advertising, use those to announce when you are hiring. Some social media sites to have business profiles and posts on include Nextdoor and Facebook.
Hire Trained Seniors

The Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP) gives low-income, unemployed seniors training they need to get jobs through a federally-funded program. Training occurs in public or non-profit venues such as hospitals, schools, senior centers, and childcare centers.

Employers may work with one of the local SCSEP partners to hire from this pool of trained, vetted senior citizens. If you would like to hire someone from this program for your childcare facility, contact one of the Gulf Coast region partners with SCSEP:

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Training New Staff

Early childhood education positions require training to get and keep. Therefore, as an employer, you’ll need to know how you will train your workers before you hire them. Consider the following ways of getting help in educating your new employees. 

On-the-Job Training

Workforce Solutions can help you to hire and train new childcare workers through on-the-job training. This program offers the following:

  • Recruiters who pair your open positions with the skills of people looking for work
  • Free access to a pool of these recruits
  • You have freedom to choose the right candidate by setting required qualifications and interviewing candidates
  • Training in your childcare operation
  • Minimal paperwork in the process
  • Get up to 50% of the new employee’s wages paid during training, up to $21 per hour, for no more than 400 hours
  • Average reimbursement to employers is $3,000

Eligible employers must establish the training protocol before hiring new employees.

Work-Based Learning Staffing Initiatives

 While early childhood education workers must have minimum education backgrounds, they can get that education while working in a childcare facility with work-based learning.

For example, a high-school student could work as an assistant caregiver while they finish their high school education. You have an extra person to help while they gain experience and training to eventually become a fully qualified caregiver. By leveraging work-based learning options, you increase the number of people qualified to work at your childcare operation.

Hire High School Students Working Toward Their CDAs

Some high schools in Texas offer Career and Technology Education (CTE) programs. High school students can earn a Child Development Associate (CDA) by the time they graduate. For more information about this program for high school students, refer to this set of guidelines from the Texas Education Agency (TEA).

Look at the Early Learning tab on this map to find school districts near you that offer this program and contact the teachers in charge of these programs at those schools to let them know that you’d like to hire their students.

Help College Students Get Required Experience for Their Early Childhood Education Classes

Another way to use the work-based learning is hiring college students working toward early childhood education degrees. In many cases, these degrees require some time working in a childcare facility.

Students participating in early childhood education programs may be in community colleges or four-year colleges. The Texas Association for the Education of Young Children has a directory of these programs across the state, so you can easily find a school near you to hire college students from.

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Apprenticeships
Texas Workforce Commission Apprenticeship Program

If you want to help your workers work while they learn, consider offering apprenticeships. The State of Texas allows businesses to offer Registered Apprenticeships that teach employees the skills of the job as they work.

The job for a Registered Apprenticeship must be on the list of Department of Labor apprenticeship occupations. Childcare workers are included on this list. Per the site, childcare workers have a work progress schedule of two years, regardless of the type of schedule: time-based, competency-based, or hybrid.

During the apprenticeships, the employee must work for your facility and complete at least 144 classroom hours of instruction in courses specific to the position.

The Department of Labor offers funds for those in apprenticeships to cover the classroom lessons costs. Contact the Texas Workforce Commission’s apprenticeship program at apprenticeshiptexas@twc.texas.gov  to find out more about these funds and starting an apprenticeship.

Texas School Ready Registered Apprenticeship Program (TSR-RAP)

Texas School Ready (TSR) registered apprenticeship program (TSR-RAP) is another option if you’d like to have an apprenticeship to educate your staff while they work for you. This RAP supports early childhood educators to earn their Child Development Associate (CDA) while they work at a childcare facility. The page about this apprenticeship program includes information on the curriculum, program components, and recruitment.

WIOA Funds

People looking for jobs can get assistance with funds from the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) program. In Texas, these funds cover programs that improve the skills and education of those looking for employment, such as adult education and literacy programs and assistance to those looking for work.

Adults and dislocated workers can get career advice and training from local Workforce Boards to prepare them for participating in the workforce. Additionally, these funds cover some types of on-the-job training for new employees and training for incumbent workers.

WIOA funds also assist employers with services such as screening and matching qualified training participants.

Work Opportunity Tax Credit

The Work Opportunity Tax Credit gives you a federal tax credit for hiring employees from target groups. Amounts vary from $1,200 to $9,600, depending on the length of employment and target group the person comes from.

Target groups include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Veterans
  • People unemployed for at least 27 months and receiving unemployment benefits of all or part of that time
  • Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients between 18 and 39
  • Recipients of Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF)
  • Referrals from vocational rehabilitation
  • Those between 18 and 39 who live in rural renewal or designated empowerment zones

To claim this credit, you’ll need to fill out IRS Form 8850 and the ETA Form 9061. Alternatively, you may have the job seeker complete ETA Form 9062 while you fill out IRS Form 8850. Send the ETA form and IRS form to the Texas Workforce Commission, which will verify eligibility for you to receive the credit.

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Pay for Employee Training with the Skills for Small Business Grant

Through the Skills for Small Business Grant, the Texas Workforce Commission provides grants to area community colleges to train employees from area small businesses. Qualifying small businesses, including childcare providers, can send their full-time employees to get the training needed to fulfill their roles or to upskill for another position.

With the program, new full-time employees who have worked for a qualifying employer for fewer than 12 months can have up to $1800 in training at a participating community college paid for. Existing full-time employees who have worked for the employer for more than 12 months have up to $900 to cover training class tuition and fees.

Qualification Requirements

Employers who want to send their workers to train at area community colleges through this program must meet the following basic requirements:

  • Have between 1 and 99 employees
  • Have a Texas Workforce Commission Unemployment Tax Account number
  • Be current in unemployment insurance payments
  • Pay workers the prevailing wage or higher
  • Be willing to pay for time when employees take classes, even if it counts as overtime
  • Be prepared to pay for costs not covered by the grant, such as books or spending beyond the allowed amount per employee

Employees who take the training classes must be:

  • Full-time, permanent workers
  • Use all the funds from the grant for training tuition and fees within 12 months of the first day of training
  • Reapplying at the end of 12 months is allowed
Area Colleges Offering Training Classes

The following community colleges in the Texas Gulf Coast region partner with TWC to offer classes under the Skills for Small Business Grant:

Applying for the Program

To apply to have employees trained, business owners need to fill out the application online. To complete the application, you will need your business’s business code. For childcare businesses, the business code on the application from NAICS is 624410.

You will also need the 9-digit TWC Unemployment Tax Account Number. If you do not have this number, call your local Workforce Solutions office to find out how to sign up for a number for unemployment tax. Requesting a number does not cost anything, but you will need to pay unemployment insurance premiums for your staff.

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T.E.A.C.H. Early Childhood Scholarship Program

If you have workers at your licensed childcare facility who want to pursue a degree in early childhood education, you can help them to cover the costs with the T.E.A.C.H. (Teacher Education and Compensation Helps) Early Childhood Scholarship program., offered by Texas Association for the Education of Young Children (TXAEYC).  

Instead of the individual paying completely for their early childhood education degree or CDA, they share the costs with their employer and the scholarship program. Part of the program also includes a T.E.A.C.H. specialist who assists employers and their workers seeking higher education to work with the program.

Commitment is a vital component of this program. Individuals receiving scholarships must commit to staying with their employers. While the individual works toward their degree or CDA, they must agree to remain working for their licensed childcare employer for the duration and for a time after their scholarship completion.

Find out more about the types of scholarships the program offers on the Scholarship Model page.

Share with your caregivers the listing of Early Childhood Education Career Pathways this scholarship could open.

Browse the list of colleges and universities participating in the T.E.A.C.H. Early Childhood program. The individual receiving a scholarship must apply, be accepted, and enroll in one of the participating schools.

To get started with T.E.A.C.H. Early Childhood Scholarship program, visit the TXAEYC page for How to Get Started.

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Workforce Solutions Scholarships and Financial Assistance for Training

Workforce Solutions offers multiple resources to help cover the costs of pursuing degrees or getting training. Some of these options include scholarships for college tuition, CDA assessment or renewal, and ECE conferences.

Check out the resources on the Scholarships and Incentives page to see if you or your staff may qualify for any of these programs.

Retaining Childcare Employees

You work hard to find employees for your childcare business, but your efforts don’t stop when they sign the onboarding paperwork or complete training. You’ll need to remain active in retaining them to ensure that they don’t leave soon after hiring.

The following resources may help you in retaining your childcare staff:

Texas Workforce Commission Videos on Retaining Staff

The Texas Workforce Commission has a series of short videos made for the childcare industry to help operators to attract and retain staff.

The videos also have attached links with more information to read through. For staff retention, the links include:

These resources can give you ideas of the types of compensation that may help you to retain your staff.

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Head Start Early Childhood Learning & Knowledge Center (ECLKC) Webinar

Head Start offers high-quality childcare and education to vulnerable three and four-year-old children to prepare them for kindergarten. Early Head Start offers similar services to infants and toddlers.

The ECLKC offers Head Start providers resources to maintain quality operations. You don’t have to be a Head Start educator to view the videos or recorded webinars on ECLKC. While some information in these resources will only pertain to Head Start educators, all childcare providers can find at least a few tips to apply to their operations.

One of those resources is a webinar recording, “Human Resources Systems to Recruit and Retain Responsive Staff.”  This video promotes ways outside of increasing benefits and pay to keep the staff you currently have.

The Promoting Staff Well Being page on ECLKC may give you some ideas on keeping your staff members mentally and physically healthy and help them to reduce burnout.

Finally, check out the five-video series on the Five Rs of Early Learning Leadership. Each video linked below focuses on one of these Rs: responsive relationships, reason, resources, reflective dialogue, and recognition.

Avoid Burnout for Yourself and Your Staff

Burnout has long afflicted those in the childcare industry. An article from 1979 by Child Care Information Exchange outlined the reasons behind director burnout, and the problem continues today.

Childcare providers of all positions must handle multiple children throughout the day, deal with parents, and directors have the added responsibilities of running a business. In fact, in a survey from Teaching Strategies published in 2022 showed that 45% of early childhood educators reported serious issues with mental health or burnout.

Burnout can cost you employees and your mental health. By preventing burnout, you can reduce staff turnover. The following are things to incorporate into your childcare business to lessen the chances of burnout for yourself and your staff:

  • Include in-service or early dismissal days into your calendar. These days give you and your staff a chance to train, clean, and reset.
  • Offer paid sick leave or paid time off to your employees, if you can afford to do so. Such a benefit will prevent employees from feeling that they have to come to work while sick, adding to their stress levels.
  • Discuss work schedules with each of your staff members to ensure that everyone has enough hours without feeling overworked.
  • Consider including training on reducing workplace stress with your other annual training courses to remind everyone on things they can do personally to ease their stress levels and avoid burnout.

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Resources for Professional Development and Employee Growth

You have numerous online resources to attain training and professional development requirements. The following offer ways for caregivers and directors to complete some of the required annual training or to enhance their overall education to move up to another role in a childcare facility or open their own.

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Ways to Connect with Other Childcare Providers in Professional Groups, Online, or In-Person

Childcare providers may feel isolated in their work, but there are multiple ways to connect to other providers to gain support, discuss methods, and more. The following are ways to get in touch with other childcare providers.

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Join a Professional Group

Childcare provider professional groups offer you a source for discussion and professional development. While many of these programs have membership fees, the cost is worthwhile from the benefits you get from the group. Some national professional groups for providers include:

First3Years

This organization is a non-profit that offers mentoring and training in numerous topics childcare providers need. Topics covered include infant mental health, trauma, separation, brain development, child development, and social-emotional development.

You need to become a member to access perks, such as 40 hours of free online training through Teachable. Without a membership, the training costs $20 per year. Additionally, members gain access to peer networking and mentoring.

Texas Infant-Toddler Specialist Network (ITSN)

The ITSN partners with the Children’s Learning Institute (CLI) and the Texas Workforce Commission. Teachers and specialists have different membership options. A teacher membership gives you priority access to training, personalized coaching, continuing education clock hours, and networking opportunities.

If your childcare facility will participate in Texas Rising Star, ITSN offers information on how its professional learning communities (PLCs) give access to training that aligns with TRS standards. For teachers, ITSN alignment is outlined in a PDF. A related file aimed at childcare center directors shows how participating in ITSN can help teachers align to TRS standards.

Texas Association of Education of Young Children (TXAEYC)

When you have membership in a national or regional associated group, you gain TXAEYC membership and access to all training options through various TXAEYC chapters. Groups that offer membership in TXAEYC include the National Association of Education of Young Children (NAEYC), the Southern Early Childhood Association (SECA), and the Associate Degree Early Childhood Teacher Educators Association (ACCESS).

The national arm of this organization, NAEYC, offers networking opportunities through online forums at all membership levels. Additionally, you have access to numerous professional resources, based on your membership.

National Child Care Association

The National Child Care Association (NCCA) offers members benefits such as networking opportunities and professional development at conferences or webinars; advocacy training; employment listings; and discounts on products, services, curriculum, and education. Additionally, if you need membership in a national professional group for your CDA or national accreditation, an NCCA membership fulfills the requirement. Membership levels available for purchase include those for childcare centers or individuals of home-based or center-based facilities.

National Association for Family Child Care (NAFCC)

The National Association for Family Child Care (NAFCC) is an accreditation and advocacy group dedicated to promoting high-quality care within family (home-based) childcare. If you choose either an ambassador or executive membership, you gain access to discounts from third-party businesses that serve the childcare industry, discounted rates to the annual conference, a free training through the Professional Development Academy, access to members-only events, business tools worth up to $150, and a discount for national accreditation through NAFCC.

Network with Other Providers In Person

Anytime you attend a workshop, seminar, or in-person training, use the time to network with other childcare providers. Talk to people at these events and exchange contact information.

You’ll develop your network of other providers in the industry to talk about challenges, offer support, and explore solutions.

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Find Other Childcare Providers Online

The internet also gives you a way to connect with other childcare providers. Check out the COOGS-created Facebook groups moderated by other childcare providers, like yourself, to connect with other providers from around southeast Texas in a private group.

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