What Qualifications Do You Need to Be a Daycare Director in Maryland?

Director qualifications are licensing rules, and in Maryland they come from the Office of Child Care, the Division of Early Childhood in the Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE).

The Office licenses child care centers under COMAR 13A.16 and registers family child care homes under a separate subtitle, COMAR 13A.15, so the rules below describe center directors.

MSDE's Licensing Branch runs 13 Regional Licensing Offices that license centers and register family child care homes.

Rule sections are amended over time, and this page describes the current COMAR text without amendment dates, so confirm the qualifications in force today with the Office of Child Care before you rely on them.

Every Maryland director starts from the same baseline: a high school diploma or GED — or two college courses, in the rule's alternative — plus either 90 clock hours of pre-service training or a CDA.

On top of that baseline, college-credit expectations rise with the size of the center; the rule writes these size tiers for preschool centers, and our research did not confirm the tiers for a school-age-only center, so confirm those with the Office of Child Care.

At a preschool center with 21 to 40 children, the director needs 30 semester hours of college credit, at least 20 of them in early childhood education, or 60 semester hours.

At a preschool center with more than 40 children, the rule asks for an associate degree with a minimum of 15 semester hours of approved early childhood education course work or a bachelor's degree in any field.

A center serving infants or toddlers adds one more item for its director: 3 semester hours of approved training related to the care of infants and toddlers, plus breastfeeding-support training.

Experience is the other variable that moves with center size.

A director at a preschool center with 20 or fewer children needs 1 year of experience.

The tiers above that — 21 to 40 children and more than 40 children — each carry 2 years of experience, paired with the education requirements described above.

The rule text our research transcribed sets the minimums by tier but does not spell out how qualifying experience is documented, so confirm documentation questions with the Office of Child Care.

Administration coursework is on the director's required list: 3 semester hours of approved administrative training, sitting alongside the fixed baseline of being at least 21, a high school diploma or GED (or two college courses), 90 clock hours of pre-service training or a CDA, 9 hours of communication training, 3 hours of ADA training, and MSDE regulation training within 6 months.

The state's credential for the field — the Maryland Child Care Credential — is a voluntary program: child care staff advance through seven credential levels and administrators through four, and a credential lasts 12 months, renewing with continued training and professional activities.

The CDA named in the baseline is awarded by the Council for Professional Recognition.

Maryland directors complete at least 12 clock hours of approved continued training per year.

That is the same annual total the state sets for preschool teachers, whose 12 hours must include at least 6 in Core of Knowledge and are recorded on a professional development plan.

The director's initial requirements also include training that carries into the job: 9 hours of communication training, 3 hours of ADA training, and MSDE regulation training due within 6 months.

The center rule answers the absence question directly: an operator must designate a child care teacher to be present and in charge of the center in case of the director's temporary absence from the center.

The rule's designee is a child care teacher — the teacher role the center rules define — and the rule text our research transcribed names no separate assistant-director designation.

Our research did not surface a separate Maryland assistant-director credential or license category, so treat an assistant-director posting as the center's own title and confirm designation questions with the Office of Child Care.

Maryland requires a director to be present in the center during at least half of the center's operating hours each week.

When the director is temporarily absent, the operator designates a child care teacher to be present and in charge.

Our research did not establish how these rules apply to a director responsible for more than one location; an operator with a multi-site question should confirm with the Office of Child Care.

Directors are named in Maryland's background-check rule: the center must ensure a federal and Maryland State criminal background check for the center applicant, the director, every employee including substitutes and volunteers, and adults living on the premises, plus child and adult abuse record reviews.

Anyone who lived in another state in the past 5 years also needs that state's criminal check.

Separately, the rule bars centers from employing anyone with a conviction, probation before judgment, or pending charge for crimes involving a child, sex offenses, violent felonies, child or adult abuse, and other listed crimes; other offenses are assessed case by case by the Office.