How many existing child care centers are likely to have play areas?
The Children’s Foundation does not collect data on how many existing child care centers have play areas. Since child care centers provide services to preschool age children and older children when they are not in school, we assume the proportion of existing child care centers with play areas ranges between 80 percent and 100 percent, yielding 92,000 to 102,000 existing play areas. We estimate that 60 percent are small, 30 percent are medium, and 10 percent are large. Based on the assumed replacement rate, we estimate that approximately 6,100 to 6,800 of existing play areas will be replaced annually at child care centers. How many new child care centers with play areas will be constructed? Data collected by the Children’s Foundation for 1999 indicates a 3.4 percent increase in the number of child care centers over 1998. If this rate of growth continues, approximately 3,500 new child care centers will be constructed in the year 2000. We assume that the proportion of new child care center
