Daycares in Colorado

Colorado scores licensed daycares through Colorado Shines, the state's quality rating program. Colorado Shines scores providers on a 1 to 5 level scale across five categories: workforce qualifications, family partnerships, administrative practices, learning environment, and child health.

Colorado's minimum legal requirements are mixed when compared with the standards published by the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), the leading professional accreditation body for early-childhood programs and the most widely cited benchmark for high-quality care. Toddler ratios are stricter than NAEYC's recommendations: Colorado caps toddler ratios at 1:5, where NAEYC accepts 1:6. Infant ratios, preschool ratios, group sizes, and staff qualifications, however, fall below NAEYC's recommendations. Colorado allows infant ratios of 1:5 (NAEYC: 1:4), preschool ratios of 1:12 (NAEYC: 1:10), infant groups of 10 (NAEYC: 8), toddler groups of 10 (NAEYC: 12), and preschool groups of 24 (NAEYC: 20). The state requires only a high school diploma for a lead teacher in a licensed center, where NAEYC's professional standard is a bachelor's degree. Pre-service training is not set in state rule, and required ongoing professional development is 15 hours per year, below NAEYC's recommended 25.

These minimum legal requirements apply to every licensed daycare in Colorado, regardless of its Colorado Shines rating. They are one of the Structural inputs in every Childery rating shown above. The rating distribution above combines that Structural input with Colorado Shines scores and other Process inputs to produce the Overall scores. For the full breakdown, see the Colorado methodology page.