The state-wide care rate of children under 3 years of age is currently 57.7 percent. As a result, Saxony-Anhalt is the frontrunner in a federal comparison.
Childcare in Saxony-Anhalt enjoys an unabated high degree of popularity and a demand that is still increasing year after year. This emerges from current statistical surveys for 2013, which the President of the Saxony-Anhalt Statistical Office, Manfred Scherschinski, presented in Magdeburg on Thursday together with Minister of Labour and Social Affairs Norbert Bischoff.
According to this, well over 137,000 children were cared for in day care centres and day care facilities on the reference date effective 31 March 2013. This was 2,100 children more than a year earlier. In particular, the demand in the nursery sector has significantly increased with a plus of almost 1,300 children.
Minister of Labour and Social Affairs Bischoff: “The increased demand is proof of the confidence and quality of the good childcare in Saxony-Anhalt. This is a cause for celebration. But at the same time, an increased demand also presents the state with the challenge of meeting the increased demand in terms of financing. Here the pencils must be sharpened and individual budgetary positions must be scrutinised”, said the Minister. According to statements by the President of the Saxony-Anhalt Statistical Office, Manfred Scherschinski, as of 1 March 2013 the number of children under 3 years of age in day care for children increased slightly in comparison to the previous year. The increase was therefore more moderate than in previous years. Between March 2009 and March 2008 the number of children in this age group increased by more than 1,500. Although a high level of day care for children was already reached in March 2006, the care rate (percentage of children under 3 years of age among all children in this age group cared for in day care centres and in publicly sponsored day care facilities) increased annually and in March 2013 reached almost double the federal average of 29.3 percent with a rate of 57.7 percent. The average in the West German federal states was 24.2 percent.
From the children aged 3 to less than 6 years of age, 96 out of 100 children were cared for in a day care facility or by a childminder. Here the care rate also increased between the years 2006 and 2012. In March 2013, 456 children more were cared for than a year earlier. Not all parents in the high birth rate years 2007 and 2008 accepted an offer of childcare, and so the care rate decreased slightly.
A total of 17,130 individuals were employed in the 1,751 day care centres on 1 March 2013. Among those individuals, 9,062 were employed as group leaders, 2,430 as additional or supplementary personnel, 2,479 in a group-overlapping capacity, 602 for promotion of children in accordance with the German Social Security Codes SGB VIII/SGB XII, 523 as managers, 156 in administration and 1,878 individuals were employed in the housekeeping/technical area. Therefore 14,573 individuals worked as educational personnel and 224 individuals also worked as managerial personnel who also performed part-time educational work with the children in addition to their managerial activity.
A total of 15,252 individuals were employed as educational, managerial and administrative personnel in the day care centres. Among those individuals, 8,288 were in the age group of 45 to less than 60 years of age. The age group of 55 to less than 60 years of age had the largest percentage of employees with 2,858 individuals, followed by the age groups 45 to less than 50 years of age and 50 to less than 55 years of age, each with 17.8 percent. Only 7 percent of employees were under 25 years old.
In Saxony-Anhalt, 14,435 individuals working in day care centres had a specialised educational vocational qualification.
The majority of educational, managerial and administrative personnel were childcare workers with 12,850 individuals (84.3 percent). A total of 536 individuals (3.5 percent) had a diploma (university of applied science, university or comparable degree) in the socio-educational, educational, special education or educational science field. A total of 691 individuals (4.5 percent) with a vocational school degree worked in the fields including special education, curative education and curative education therapy, and 281 individuals (1.8 percent) were employed as childcare assistants.