With the increase of wildfires and flooding in the NWT it’s important that you take the steps to ensure your early learning and child care program is safe before, during, and after an emergency.

Communications outages

The Early Learning and Child Care Standards Regulations identifies the requirement that all licensed early learning and child care programs must have a working telephone (or cellular device) on site to operate. This is to ensure that you can reach families and ensure the safety of children in emergency situations.

In situations where an entire community has lost all communication services (phone or internet), you can decide to remain open and operate if the health, safety, or well-being of the children attending your program is not affected, and you have proper planning in place.

Power outages and loss of water

The Early Learning and Child Care Standards Regulations identifies the requirement that all licensed early learning and child care programs must have access to hot water for sanitization purposes. While licensed programs may be able to cope with a loss of power or water services temporarily, once a program is unable to provide hot water it creates an unsafe condition for children and therefore, we ask that programs close immediately.

Be prepared 

All licensed early learning and child care programs must have an have up to date emergency procedures in place. Having a written emergency plans in place ensure staff and families are prepared and understand their roles during an emergency. Take time to update your emergency procedures and communicate your plans with families so they know what steps will be taken.

Review your plan regularly and: 

• Determine other modes of communication 
• Keep families and emergency contact information it up to date
• Practice your plan so everyone knows what needs to be done
• Have a different plan in for different types of scenarios/emergencies

More information

The Responding to Emergencies: A Handbook for Early Childhood Programs is available to help you develop an emergency plan or update your current plans.

If you have any additional about emergency preparedness, contact your regional Early Childhood Consultant.