How to Start a Daycare in West Virginia: Licensing Steps, Costs and Staffing

West Virginia licenses child care centers under Legislative Rule 78CSR1, Child Care Centers Licensing, which took effect April 1, 2023 under West Virginia Code §49-2-121.

The rule text still carries a Department of Health and Human Resources header, but licensing now sits with the West Virginia Department of Human Services' Division of Early Care and Education.

Family child care facilities are licensed under 78CSR18 and family child care homes are registered under 78CSR19.

The center rule carries its own termination clause — 78CSR1 is set to sunset on August 1, 2028 — so confirm the current rule text with the Division before you rely on any summary, including this one.

A West Virginia child care center is care for 13 or more children, in any setting, when the facility is open for more than 30 days per year per child.

Below that line, the rules name no separate group home category: home-based care splits into the licensed family child care facility under 78CSR18 and the registered family child care home under 78CSR19.

A registered home may care for no more than six children under 13 at any one time, with no more than two under 24 months, and resident and visiting children under 6 count toward the cap.

A family child care facility serves more children than a registered home but fewer than 13, and it must have two staff members on duty whenever it cares for more than two children under 24 months or more than six children at once.

The category you pick drives the rest of this page: the application, the staff rules and the ratios you will staff to.

Our research captured West Virginia's license terms but not a step-by-step account of the application or the pre-licensing inspection visit, so get the current sequence from the Division of Early Care and Education before you commit to a site.

What the rules do establish: a family child care facility must apply for and obtain a certificate of license before beginning operations and accepting children, and a center license does not survive a change of hands or address — a new owner or a new location needs a new license before operating.

Qualifying staff is part of the same pipeline: each center staff member and volunteer needs a state and federal fingerprint-based background check through WV CARES, plus sex offender registry checks and out-of-state checks for anyone who lived elsewhere in the past five years.

Our research did not confirm a required pre-application orientation or the steps of an initial inspection; ask the Division what your site type and license category should expect.

Center directors must be at least 21 with a high school diploma or GED and one year of relevant experience, plus credentials that scale with center type: Type I (30 or fewer children), Type II (31-60), Type III (61 or more).

A Type I director needs a CDA plus 300 hours of experience, 12 ECE credits plus 300 hours, or 10 years of relevant work experience; Type II needs the Registered Apprenticeship Certificate for Child Development Specialist, 28 college credits (9 in early childhood development), or at least 15 years of relevant work experience; Type III needs a degree and may not have regular responsibility for a group of children.

A teacher must be at least 18 with a year of relevant work experience plus the WVTCECE training certificate, a CDA or 12 ECE credits (each plus 300 hours), or two years of relevant work experience.

When the director is off site, a person-in-charge qualified at least as a teacher performs director duties.

Qualified center staff must complete 15 hours of approved training in year one — directors: 6 on management — and at least 15 every year after, applying for credentialing on the WV STARS Career Pathway.

West Virginia sets center ratios and maximum group sizes in Appendix 78-1-E, Table A of 78CSR1: infants from 6 weeks to 12 months are staffed at 1:4 with a maximum group of 8, and school-age groups at 1:16 with a group of 32.

The bookends matter for a startup budget because the infant band decides how many qualified caregivers each nursery room needs.

Two structural rules apply across every room: at least two staff members must be on duty whenever children are on the premises — at the start and end of the day the second may be support staff, if only one qualified person is needed to meet ratio — and a mixed-age group follows the ratio and group size of its youngest child.

At nap time, groups 12 months and under keep every ratio staff member in the sleep area.

The clearest timing rule in 78CSR1 is the license term: a center license or certificate of approval is valid for up to two years from issuance, renewal applications are due at least 60 days before expiration, and a new owner or a new location requires a new license before operating.

Beyond that, our research did not confirm West Virginia's center application fees or any pre-application orientation, so get the current fee schedule from the Division of Early Care and Education before you budget.

For national context only, a September 2021 U.S. Treasury report described most for-profit child care facilities as operating on razor-thin profit margins usually below 1 percent and, citing a Center for American Progress cost analysis, suggested wages run at least 50-60 percent of child care expenses on U.S. averages — context for how large a share of a center's operating expenses payroll can take.

No West Virginia-specific startup cost figures appeared in the sources we read.

West Virginia's quality money runs through the WV Tiered Reimbursement System rather than a star rating: Tier II and Tier III programs earn higher subsidy rates, and eligibility takes a regular two-year license, at least one year of operation and a provider service agreement with the local CCR&R, so a new center cannot qualify at opening.

Tier II status renews yearly with Environment Rating Scale self-assessments for each age group, and programs that move up a tier receive a one-time bonus whose amount depends on available funding.

On the workforce side, WV STARS offers scholarship and wage incentive programs for child care providers — terms our research did not verify — and the Apprenticeship for Child Development Specialist (ACDS) is a four-semester registered apprenticeship whose certificate qualifies holders as Type II directors and lead teachers under 78CSR1, a credentialing route worth offering your own staff.

T.E.A.C.H. does not operate in West Virginia, so do not plan around it.

State licensing is not the only approval a site may need.

Local zoning, building and fire requirements in your West Virginia locality were not established in our research — the sources this page is built on are the state legislative rules and state agency policy, not city or county codes.

Before you commit to a site, check with your city or county planning or zoning office and your local fire official, and ask the Division of Early Care and Education which local clearances your license application needs.

West Virginia's three child care rules all took effect April 1, 2023, and 78CSR1 carries a termination clause set for August 1, 2028, so the center rule has an end date written into it.

The Tiered Reimbursement policy was updated in May 2025.

Because the center rule itself is dated to sunset, re-check the current rule text and any revisions with the Division of Early Care and Education rather than working from an older guide.