A 180-name waiting list at a newly opened French-language daycare in Sarnia is an indication of strong local demand for spaces, local French Catholic school board officials say.
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Factors include a growing Francophone population in Sarnia, and huge demand for early childhood educators in the province, amid the move to $10-a-day childcare on average, said Rachelle Morissette, early years’ coordinator with Conseil Scolaire Catholique Providence.
“The need and the want is there,” she said.
La Garderie Beaux Sourires, or Beautiful Smiles Daycare, held its grand opening Wednesday, after starting operations mid-May in the school board-owned building also home to Saint-Francois Xavier secondary school.
Currently 13 youngsters younger than six are enrolled at the daycare, said Nicole Buteau, president with London French Day Care Centre, which opened Beaux Sourires as its second site under a one-year renewable lease agreement with the board.
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“We would be full if we had the staff,” Buteau said, noting 11 currently working on site.
Hopes are to get to 15 by September, and fill all 32 daycare spaces, she said.
The facility that’s long housed French-language daycares has been sitting empty since the fall of 2022, when another provider closed because of lack of staffing, said the board’s early years’ lead Estelle Tonietto.
Demand at the site isn’t just for French-speaking families, she said.
“For some of them, they just want services,” she said.
“They’ll take the French just because there’s a space at this point.”
Herman Gill’s daughter, who turns three in July, is one.
Gill moved to Canada from India in 2014, and made his way to Sarnia from Brampton.
His family speaks Punjabi and English already, he said, adding learning French is “just to collect more languages as knowledge,” which can be helpful for things like traveling.
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Sarnia, meanwhile, received French-language services designation late 2021 under Ontario’s French Language Act, with a deadline of Nov. 1 of this year to offer French language services at provincial government offices.
The francophone population at the time in Sarnia-Lambton was said to be about 5,400, or 4.2 per cent.
Adding the new daycare helps with designation efforts, Tonietto said.
It may not be the last expansion site either for the London French Day Care Centre, which also is growing it’s 61-space Forest City site by adding two more rooms in January, Buteau said.
“We want to bring our French services to different towns in Southwestern Ontario,” she said.
The school board that runs from Windsor to Woodstock and into Owen Sound could be a good partner, Tonietto said.
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“We do have (childcare) services in a lot of our schools, but as long as we have partners that want to open up and we have the spaces, we’re open to considering all partnerships.”
The school board also has another daycare in Sarnia, at Saint-Thomas-d’Aquin elementary school, she said.
Lambton officials noted last November recruitment efforts weren’t keeping up with the need for early childhood educators, including staffing another 573 local child-care spaces by late 2026 under a federal-provincial deal.
The Canada-Wide Early Learning and Child Care system was launched in 2021 with $27 billion and a five-year goal for $10-a-day daycare on average in all provinces.
Ontario’s was $23 a day, on average, ace of may. Eight other provinces have already met the $10 mark.
Ontario, last November, announced plans to increase wages in licensed child care centers for ECEs, to help with the supply shortage.
-with files from Paul Morden, the London Free Press, and The Canadian Press
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