Parents Welcome Increase In Pre-School Capacity

Infantcare capacity will be increased to over 8,000 by 2020.

- Nancy Ang

As parents, deciding on the right pre-school for your child is an important decision. Whether it’s a newly-set up childcare centre or an established one, a pre-school near your workplace or home, a Montessori system or play-based one — you can choose from a host of childcare and infantcare choices.

Cost, location and curriculum were part of Ronald Lee’s consideration when he was looking for an infantcare centre to enrol his son in. An IT consultant, Lee felt that it was important for the infantcare centres to offer activities that his son could participate in, even though his son, Tristan, was only 13 months old then.

Lee is among an increasing number of parents who entrust infantcare centres to mind their two- to 18-month-old children when they are at work. The enrolment figure today is about one in 10 babies, a growth of 60 per cent since 2012.

Location and curriculum aside, digital consultant JH Mah picked his three-year-old son’s pre-school for the school environment and teachers, “It has to have a warm and caring environment that my son would feel comfortable and at home in.”

Over the years, as more women and grandparents enter or remain in the workforce, fewer are available to look after their children and grandchildren. Says IT executive Genevieve Chin, who placed both her children in infantcare centres, “I have no domestic helper and my parents-in-law are both working.”