Two Indigenous-led daycare centres to open in Chatham-Kent
CBC
Two new Indigenous-led childcare centres are opening up in Southwestern Ontario next month.
The Ska:na Family Learning Centre has partnered with the municipality of Chatham-Kent to open new centres in Chatham-Kent and Wallaceburg.
"We are super excited to be serving a large population in Ontario. It's amazing," Faith Hale, said the executive director of the Ska:na Family Learning Centre.
The Ska:na Family Learning Centre, a non-profit organization has seven childcare locations and four EarlyON child and family sites across Southwestern Ontario.
The need for more Indigenous-led daycare centres was based on a growing need of services for urban families as well as an increasing population of Indigenous people coming to Chatham-Kent for work and school.
According to Hale, Indigenous people make up four per cent of the population in Chatham-Kent.
Kelly Emery, director of Children's Services for the Municipality of Chatham-Kent, stressed the importance of relevant programming for the Indigenous population in the area.
At a time when Canada is vastly expanding its child-care system, and just eight months after a major E. coli outbreak in Calgary child-care centres, an Alberta Health Services analysis shows the province is lagging in its rate of daycare inspections, falling far short of its guideline of at least two inspections per year at each of the province's licensed daycare centres.