As the designated service system manager for the Wellington service delivery area, the County of Wellington is responsible for planning and managing child care and early years services that respond to the needs of children and families across the County of Wellington and the City of Guelph.
The Children's Early Years Division produces data and information and accesses a variety of other sources to help plan and manage child care and early years services.
Planning for Child Care and Early Years Services
The Child Care and Early Years Service Plan 2023-2027 includes how we are transitioning licensed child care into a high quality early learning and child care system. There are Child Care and Early Years (including Best Start) service plans from 2000 to now. Please contact us for a copy of older service plans. The Wellington Directed Growth Plan is an addendum to the Child Care and Early Years Service Plan 2023-2027. The Directed Growth Plan presents current licensed child care coverage and population characteristics for each of the municipalities within Wellington-Guelph.
Every municipality in Wellington-Guelph needs child care! The Value of Child Care report outlines the unique features of each municipality in the region, and the level of child care currently available to that community.
For more information about the importance of high-quality licensed child care across Wellington-Guelph, please visit the Children's Early Years webpages below.
Community Planning
Data in the Early Years
Licensed Child Care Availability
| Municipality | Children Ages Birth up to 4 Years | Children Ages 4-5 Years | Children Ages 6-12 Years | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| # of Child Care spaces | Access Rate | # of Child Care spaces | Access Rate | # of Child Care spaces | Access Rate | |
| Centre Wellington | 214 | 16.5% | 182 | 24.6% | 180 | 7.0% |
| Erin | 145 | 34.9% | 114 | 50.7% | 150 | 17.2% |
| Guelph | 1,984 | 33.8% | 843 | 26.6% | 1,249 | 11.0% |
| Guelph/Eramosa | 178 | 36.0% | 39 | 13.7% | 105 | 8.9% |
| Mapleton | 16 | 2.1% | 0 | 0.0% | 0 | 0.0% |
| Minto | 57 | 12.0% | 0 | 0.0% | 0 | 0.0% |
| Puslinch | 16 | 7.0% | 0 | 0.0% | 0 | 0.0% |
| Wellington North | 58 | 8.9% | 26 | 8.8% | 30 | 2.7% |
| Wellington service delivery area | 2,668 | 26.2% | 1,204 | 22.0% | 1,714 | 8.7% |
| Note. Access rates refer to the number of licensed child care spaces available for each age group (birth to age 4, ages 4-5, ages 6-12) as a proportion of the number of children who live in each area. Child care spaces include all licensed full-time and part-time spaces. Statistics Canada, 2021 Census of Population; County of Wellington Licensed Child Care database, as of September 30, 2024. | ||||||
Population Data (Statistics Canada)
| Municipality | Municipal Population | Children Ages Birth up to 4 Years | Children Ages 4-5 Years | Children Ages 6-12 Years | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Child Population | % of Municipal Population | Child Population | % of Municipal Population | Child Population | % of Municipal Population | ||
| Centre Wellington | 31,093 | 1,300 | 4.2% | 740 | 2.4% | 2,560 | 8.2% |
| Erin | 11,981 | 415 | 3.5% | 225 | 1.9% | 870 | 7.3% |
| Guelph | 143,740 | 5,875 | 4.1% | 3,165 | 2.2% | 11,315 | 7.9% |
| Guelph/Eramosa | 13,904 | 495 | 3.6% | 285 | 2.0% | 1,175 | 8.5% |
| Mapleton | 10,839 | 755 | 7.0% | 420 | 3.9% | 1,345 | 12.4% |
| Minto | 9,094 | 475 | 5.2% | 225 | 2.5% | 845 | 9.3% |
| Puslinch | 7,944 | 230 | 2.9% | 120 | 1.5% | 575 | 7.2% |
| Wellington North | 12,431 | 655 | 5.3% | 295 | 2.4% | 1,120 | 9.0% |
| Wellington service delivery area | 241,026 | 10,200 | 4.2% | 5,475 | 2.3% | 19,805 | 8.2% |
Provincial Resources
- Find Child Care - Ministry of Education
- Child Care and Early Years Act, 2014
- How Does Learning Happen? Ontario's Pedagogy for the Early Years (PDF)
- Think, Feel, Act: Lessons from research about young children
- Think, Feel, Act: Empowering children in the middle years
- College of Early Childhood Educators
- Association of Early Childhood Educators of Ontario (AECEO)