Children who receive a quality education from an early age are more likely to graduate high school, attend higher education institutions and are less likely to be incarcerated. That's the findings from a new report released by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC).
And yet, early childhood educators remain one of the most underpaid in the nation. 
Rhian Evans Allvin,
“[Educators need] a pedagogical understanding of human development and child development,” said Rhian Evans Allvin, CEO of NAEYC.
Allvin surveyed close to 30 higher education leaders in higher education institutions and organizations to identify the problems with the current early childhood education (ECE) system and what could be done to resolve them.
The report highlights the pay disparity and notes that even with a bachelor’s degree, the average pay for early childhood educators is $11 per hour, a rate lower than most fast-food restaurant workers and dog-walkers. Over half of this workforce is eligible for public assistance and only about 15 percent of them receive health insurance from their employers. Early childhood educators of color have an even harder time than their white counterparts. Even though over half of the ECE workforce identifies as BIPOC (Black, Indigenous People of Color), they have fewer opportunities for promotion and advancement in the field and they don’t have the same equitable access to higher education.
The low compensation has led to underfunding in ECE programs at a number of higher education institutions and even the closure of some ECE programs during the pandemic.
“Higher education has found it hard economically to sustain ECE programs in the face of poor salary prospects for their graduates. Despite growth as a profession, the pool of applicants for bachelor's degree credentials is challengingly thin,” said Dr. Camilla Persson Benbow, dean of education and human development at Vanderbilt University.
