“I chose to become an ECE because I wanted a purpose that was more than a job. Something that felt meaningful and important. And what could be more important than caring for young children?
When I graduated, I got a job at a childcare centre working a split shift. I was so thrilled and excited to begin doing the work that I loved. Once I began working, I quickly realized my job as an ECE was destabilizing my life. Because of my low pay, I could not justify the $15 cost of taking transit to work each day. So, every day, regardless of the weather, I would bike to work, back home at the end of my split shift, then bike back to work, and then bike home at the end of the day. It was a 20-minute ride four times a day, and combined with the physical demands of my work, I was exhausted. By the end of the day, biking up the large hill on my route home from work felt almost impossible.
Then COVID happened and the demands of my work and the daily pressures increased. I no longer got to spend one-on-one time with children, and spent most of my day sanitizing with bleach, which would sting my nose even through my double layered mask. In the afternoon at pick up, when I was outside with the toddlers, things almost felt normal. The children were laughing and playing, and I could wave to parents as they waited at the gate to pick up their children. At this point I had decided to leave the centre to go back to school and get my degree so I could hopefully make more money, but this glimmer of normalcy made me doubt my decision to leave, even when the work was crushing me.
The fact was, I wanted to be in the toddler room, not back in school. But working as an ECE felt like being in an abusive relationship: I was given just enough hope to want to stay. The childcare system felt abusive, and I knew I had to leave. Leaving my job felt like I was betraying myself and the children and families I cared for. I desperately wanted to keep that part of myself alive and stay in the field, but the low wages left me with this impossible decision.
I left the job that I loved because I did not make enough money. I never thought I was a person who cared about money until I did not have enough. If I had been paid better, I would still be in that toddler room caring for and educating children and living my values as the ECE I know I could be. ECEs need better pay to stay in their jobs. Recruitment and retention are directly tied to starvation wages. I am an example of this. ECEs do not deserve to be so exhausted at the end of the day that they cannot climb the hill to get home. If the childcare system can take care of what matters by giving ECEs livable wages I know we will have a solid childcare system with ECEs who can afford to stay in their jobs.”