Procare Solutions Releases 2024 Child Care Management Software Industry Trends Report

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Feb 20, 2024, 12:03 ET

DENVER, Feb. 20, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Procare Solutions, a leader in child care management software for more than 30 years, is pleased to announce the release of our 2024 Child Care Management Software Industry Trends Report.

This report provides a comprehensive look at the current state of the child care industry's use of technology as well as challenges that early childhood education programs must adapt to, and overcome, to thrive.

Hiring and retaining staff remains the biggest challenge among child care providers.

The survey results show five main challenges: attaining optimal enrollment, collecting tuition, hiring and retaining staff, professional development and a lack of government funding and support.

The biggest change year-over-year was a dramatic uptick in how many centers reported being at optimal enrollment.

Highlights from the 2024 Child Care Management Software Industry Trends Report include:

67% of centers reported being at capacity or over capacity, up from 42% in the previous year's survey
47% of centers struggle with enrollment
61% say it's a challenge to hire and retain staff (down 6% from last year)
30% need more professional development for teachers and staff
44% not using child care management software reported relying on paper and pencil to run their programs
29% cited a lack of government funding as a major challenge
11% struggle with processing payments and 43% have experienced at least one rejected or declined transaction or bounced check when trying to collect tuition

DOWNLOAD THE REPORT.

The findings in this report come from a comprehensive survey of more than 100,000 child care leaders, directors, teachers and other stakeholders in ECE to better understand the current state of the industry regarding software usage.

But the findings detailed in this report go deeper than software. In compiling this data, the goal was to better understand the obstacles being faced by child care providers. To provide more context to the findings, Procare Solutions partnered with experts in several areas of early childhood education.

Their shared knowledge in this report will help child care providers assess their operations, as well as how they can improve the education they provide to young learners preparing for kindergarten.

This is the second report published by Procare Solutions identifying trends in child care management software to illustrate industry benchmarks and how automation can put time back into child care providers' days.

"We work every day to find solutions to the challenges faced by early childhood education professionals," said JoAnn Kintzel, CEO of Procare Solutions. "Technology can help alleviate some of these pressures, yet our findings once again show that many centers are still relying on time-consuming methods to run their child care businesses."

Using the data in this report, child care leaders can better forecast their futures and make plans to grow their business, despite challenges that can seem overwhelming.

Download your copy of the 2024 Child Care Management Software Industry Trends Report.

About Procare Solutions
For more than 30 years, Procare Solutions has been helping early childhood educators simplify operations and create meaningful connections with families, so they can focus on what matters most – the children in their care.

From registration, attendance tracking, staff management and lesson planning to family engagement, tuition collection and reporting, we help ease the challenges faced of running a child care business.

Our dedicated team of support professionals also make it easy to get up and running quickly and answer questions along the way. That's why over 37,000 customers choose Procare. We are proud to be a leader in child care management software. For more information, visit ProcareSolutions.com.

SOURCE Procare Solutions