What Are the Requirements to Be a Daycare Teacher in Arizona?

Arizona child care centers — the statutes call them child care facilities — are licensed by the Arizona Department of Health Services (ADHS), under Title 36, Chapter 7.1 of the Arizona Revised Statutes and Title 9, Chapter 5 of the Arizona Administrative Code.

A facility needs an ADHS license when it regularly provides child care for compensation to five or more children who are not related to the proprietor.

The qualification, training and health rules below sit in that Title 9 chapter; the fingerprint-check requirement for staff is a separate statute rather than part of that chapter.

ADHS is the licensing agency to confirm all of them with.

Arizona's rule calls its lead-teacher equivalent the teacher-caregiver.

The base route asks for at least 18 years of age, six months of child care experience, and a high school diploma or equivalent — or 12 college credits including 6 in early childhood in place of the diploma.

The alternative routes drop the experience minimum: an associate or bachelor's degree in early childhood or child development, or an N.A.C., CDA or C.C.P. credential, qualifies on its own.

These routes are the licensing minimums, not any center's hiring requirements — read each job posting for the qualifications a specific employer asks for on top of them.

The assistant route is the assistant teacher-caregiver: at least 16 years old, with documentation of one of the following — current enrollment in high school or HSE classes, a high school diploma or equivalent, participation in vocational rehabilitation, or 12 months of experience as an aide or a volunteer.

Any one of the four satisfies the rule on its own, which makes this a route for students and career changers who have not yet built the six months of experience the lead route asks for.

Arizona's starting-line training requirement is facility orientation.

Within 10 calendar days of your starting date, the licensee provides and each staff member who provides child care services completes training for new staff members, a course that covers 17 topics including child abuse reporting, sun safety and hand washing.

The other start-date deadlines are not part of orientation: the tuberculosis clearance in the health section below is due on or before your starting date, and the fingerprint clearance card in the background-check section must be in hand before you start — each under its own rule.

Arizona center staff who provide child care services complete 18 or more actual hours of training every 12 months, and the hours must fall in at least two of the rule's listed topic areas.

Two groups owe more within that total: a staff member with less than 12 months of child care experience completes at least 12 hours in child growth and development during their first year, and infant caregivers complete six hours of infant topics each year.

Those extra hours sit inside the 18-hour total rather than on top of it.

Arizona's first aid and CPR rule is a coverage rule rather than a certificate for every employee: a staff member who has current training in first aid and CPR must be present at all times during hours of operation, on field trips and in vehicles.

For health checks, each staff member submits, on or before their starting date, evidence of freedom from infectious active tuberculosis — for example, a negative TB skin test within the previous 12 months.

Arizona requires child care personnel, including volunteers, to hold a valid fingerprint clearance card before starting employment or volunteer work.

The card is issued under the state's fingerprinting statute, so the clearance is in hand before the first day rather than arranged after hiring.

Ask the center you are applying to how it schedules fingerprinting, and confirm current card requirements with ADHS.

The third classroom title in the staff-qualification rule is the teacher-caregiver aide, which the rule opens at age 16.

The defining restriction is that aides and student-aides may not be counted in staff-to-child ratios.

Our research did not find an Arizona licensing rule requiring center staff to join the Arizona Early Childhood Workforce Registry, and the federal CCDF rule does not require individual staff to join a registry either.

That absence is our reading of the qualification and training rules rather than an agency statement, so put a membership question to ADHS.

The Registry does matter for advancement: it is the gateway to the First Things First college scholarships, which fund degrees and credentials for people working with children birth through 5, and the Registry places members on a five-level Career Lattice based on training, education and experience, with membership active for one year.

The rule history printed with Arizona's staff-qualification rule shows its last amendment was by exempt rulemaking effective September 30, 2010.

Licensing rules do change, so treat ADHS's current rule text — not this summary — as the controlling version, and confirm the requirements with the agency before you rely on them.