Does anyone know of any childcare centers that hire teens for after-school positions?

Question

im 16 and that is the after-school job i really want. i live in wisconsin, but in general do you know any that would hire @ 16? i want to work with kids. thnx.

Answer 1

I would guess the laws would vary from state to state, but I would think that it would be more likely at after-school centers for older kids than at childcare centers for small children for several reasons.

For one thing, part-time jobs exist to cover busy periods in organizations, for the most part. Since most daycare centers take children in in the morning and care for them until their parents get off work, there is no reason why they would be busier after school than they would be at other times of day. They would therefore need people who could work the full day, rather than part-time workers.

Secondly,and more importantly, most parents expect their childcare providers, since they are acting in place of the parents themselves, to have a lot of experience with children. I certainly wouldn't be comfortable knowing that if I left my child at a professional childcare center, they were being taken care of by a teenager. In many cases, you have to have specialized education to work in a childcare center, which a teen wouldn't have.

A third reason not to hire a teen would be the legal liability involved. Since the owner of a center could be presumed to realize that a teen wouldn't have much competence with children, they would have to supervise them very closely, watching everything they do. It would probably be easier just to do the work themselves. It may be possible to work in a childcare center doing something like office work, but porbably not working with the kids themselves.