With summer in full swing, many early childhood care programs are navigating sudden shifts in staffing, attendance, activities, and daily operations. More than 56% of center-based child care providers experience changes in enrollment numbers during the summer months, triggering adjustments in pricing, staffing, hours, and more.

These seasonal changes create significant behavioral and economic differences between staff and families – differences that can have an outsized impact on a program’s bottom line. Proactive child care leaders develop and implement strategies to reduce summer strains while capitalizing on new opportunities.

With this in mind, Playground analyzed data from thousands of child care providers on their summertime operational changes in staffing, pricing, enrollment, and hours of care. Regional differences across the Northeast, Midwest, South, and West reveal how local competition is adapting this season.

Key Findings 

• The average early childhood care provider hires 6 temporary summer staff members. Center-based child care providers hire an average of 5.95 additional temporary workers to meet summer demand. These hires can help cover additional enrollees, special licensing requirements for different care offerings, or cover shifts for existing staff that may be taking time off. Regionally, the West averages the most temporary summer hires at 6.53 per center, compared to the South which has the lowest average summer hire rate at 5.49.

• One-third of ECE centers change their pricing during the summertime. Nationwide, 32.2% of providers change tuition temporarily, often in response to shifts in enrollment, age groups, and care hours. Centers in the South are the most likely to do so, with 42.8% adjusting prices.

• Half of early childhood care centers in the South take on additional ages during summer. Half of early childhood programs in the South expand the ages they serve, potentially to offset enrollment drops among their core 0 to 5 population. This diversification can help mitigate risks to a center’s bottom line during a slow season. Because older children generally require lower staff-to-child ratios, adding them can also provide centers with greater staffing flexibility.

• Northeast centers stand out for summer stability. Early childhood programs in this region show the least disruption across nearly every metric. Less than 7% of Northeast centers change their care hours or staffing practices in the summer, though they still hire the second-most temporary summer workers (6.38 per center average). Only one-third adjust the ages they serve – well below the national average of 41.1% – and just 12.7% charge different rates.

• Care hours fluctuate most in the Midwest. On average, 28.3% of child care centers in the Midwest offer different care hours during the summer, compared to 22.6% in the West; 22.1% in the South; and just 6.6% in the Northeast. Nationwide, 24.3% of early childhood care centers change their hours for the summer.

Data and Methodology

This analysis focuses on center-based providers primarily serving children ages 0 through 5. It draws from responses by 2,117 child care centers across the United States, including:

• Northeast: 286 centers  

• Midwest: 431 centers  

• South: 797 centers  

• West: 603 centers

The data comes from the National Survey of Early Care and Education (NSECE) 2024, Center-based Provider survey. One extreme outlier in the Northeast (a provider reporting 300 additional temporary summer staff) was excluded from average staffing calculations to avoid skewing results.