A PEI early learning and child care centre is licensed by the Early Learning and Child Care Board: $75 for up to 25 children, $150 for more, a licence valid for three years, with a staffing plan, criminal record and vulnerable sector checks, and fire and public health inspections.
Applies in: Prince Edward Island
Prince Edward Island licenses centres through one board and one Act. The Early Learning and Child Care Board issues the licence under the Early Learning and Child Care Act and Regulations, for a fee of $75 for a centre serving up to 25 children and $150 for a larger one, valid for three years. The application is a webform plus supporting documents — a staffing plan, and criminal record and vulnerable sector checks dated within six months — and the premises must satisfy both the Fire Prevention Act and the Public Health Act before the Board approves.
This guide covers centre-based care only. PEI's Family Home Centre is a different licence for a different setting, and unlicensed care is a different legal position again.
PEI licenses three kinds of centre, and an Early Childhood Centre is the full-range one: it provides services for infants (birth to 22 months), preschool children (22 months old to school entry), and school-aged children (school entry to 12 years). Preschool Centres and School-Age Centres cover the narrower bands.
The category goes on the application, and it shapes the staffing plan and the premises requirements that follow. Licensed centres in PEI must comply with the regulations on the licensed category they hold — a centre licensed for preschoolers that quietly takes infants is outside its licence, not ahead of its paperwork.
The Board's application runs online. Alongside the webform questions, the applicant uploads supporting documents whose contents are described in the Board's licence application guidelines for early childhood, preschool, and school age centres. The core of the file:
Full payment of the application fee goes in with the application. The Board notes that an applicant may begin the application without all of the requirements in place — the file can be opened while documents are gathered — and Early Years Division staff are available to help complete it. The Board can be reached at ELCCBoard@gov.pe.ca, through the Early Years Division at the Aubin Arsenault Building in Charlottetown.
Staff certification runs beside the centre licence: every educator holds certification through the Board, at one of the levels the province sets — a person can hold only one level of certification at a time — and a certification is valid for three years from the date it is issued.
The Board cannot approve the licence until the premises clear two statutes:
Environmental Health does the health side of the inspection work and reports to the Board; its child care facility work includes consultations, plan approval, food safety, infection control, and water quality. The Board warns about the practical consequence in plain terms: the time frame for inspections depends on the waiting list at the time of application, and final approval can be delayed further if renovations to the facility are necessary — its examples are exit stairs and additional washroom facilities. Both examples are common in converted buildings, so a premises walk-through with the inspection requirements in hand belongs before the lease, not after it.
If a facility does not pass, the pattern is correction and follow-up: a violation corrected before the follow-up inspection leaves the operator in compliance, while continuing non-compliance goes back to the Board.
Licensing and designation are separate decisions. An Early Childhood Centre that follows the province's early learning framework is called an Early Years Centre, and Early Years Centres carry regulated parent fees of $10 a day for children from birth to school entry.
That fee shapes the whole business model — staffing costs against a regulated $10-a-day parent fee, with the province's funding structure behind the designation criteria. Read the designation criteria before writing the business plan, because a centre budgeted at unregulated parent fees and a designated centre are different businesses wearing the same licence.
A centre licence is valid for three years. Renewal is priced like the first licence — $75 for up to 25 children in care, $150 for 26 or more — and the renewal file refreshes the compliance record: a current staffing plan, up-to-date criminal record and vulnerable sector checks, and verification of emergency first aid training for each staff member. The province advises allowing four weeks to receive the renewed licence, so the renewal application belongs in the diary well before the expiry month.
The Board's licensing page does not publish staff-to-child ratios by age group or indoor and outdoor space standards for centres, so this guide states neither — both sit in the Act's regulations and the Board's application guidelines for the specific centre category. The page also does not state how often the Board meets to decide centre applications, or a standard processing time for a new licence; the only timeline given is the four weeks advised for renewals, and the warning that inspection waiting lists set the pace.
The Early Learning and Child Care Board. Centres are licensed through the Board under the Early Learning and Child Care Act and Regulations, and the Board also monitors centres and investigates complaints. This guide covers centres — Early Childhood Centres, Preschool Centres, and School-Age Centres — not Family Home Centres, which are a separate licence.
The fee follows the number of children the operator proposes to serve: $75 for up to 25 children, and $150 for more than 25 children. Full payment of the application fee goes in with the application. Renewal, every three years, is priced the same way: $75 for up to 25 children in care and $150 for 26 or more.
Alongside the webform, the Board requires supporting documents described in its licence application guidelines, including the category of licence, a staffing plan setting out certifications, positions, responsibilities, and policies and procedures, and a Criminal Record Check and Vulnerable Sector Search for the applicant and each person associated with the facility, dated within six months of the application. You may begin the application without every requirement in place.
Two statutes gate the approval: before the Board can approve a licence, the premises must meet the requirements of both the Fire Prevention Act and the Public Health Act. Environmental Health inspects child care facilities as part of the licensing process — consultations, plan approval, food safety, infection control, and water quality — and reports back to the Board. Renovations the inspections require, such as exit stairs or additional washrooms, can delay final approval.
Three years. The Board issues and renews licences under the Act, and the renewal service asks for an up-to-date staffing plan, current criminal record and vulnerable sector checks, and verification of emergency first aid training for each staff member. The province asks operators to allow four weeks to receive a renewed licence.
An Early Childhood Centre that follows the province's early learning framework is designated an Early Years Centre. Early Years Centres carry regulated parent fees of $10 a day for children from birth to school entry age. Designation is a separate step from licensing: the licence makes the centre legal, and the designation brings the regulated fee and the framework that goes with it.