Kentucky

Staff-child ratios (centers)

Requirements

Annual training

First year: 6 hours of orientation plus 9 hours of cabinet-approved early care and education training; every year thereafter: 15 hours of cabinet-approved training (July 1-June 30), including at least 1.5 hours on pediatric abusive head trauma. Centers must ensure staff receive first aid and CPR training (922 KAR 2:090 Section 11; 2:120 Section 7(8)).

Lead teacher

Kentucky requires no ECE credential for classroom caregivers: staff with supervisory authority over children (hired since January 2009) need a high school diploma, GED, or Commonwealth Child Care Credential, plus TB clearance and background checks (922 KAR 2:090 Section 11).

Director

Directors must be at least 21 with a high school diploma/GED; a Type I center director must also have a bachelor's or master's in education/child development or three years of verifiable full-time paid experience working directly with children, while Type II directors have lighter combined training/experience options (922 KAR 2:090 Section 10).

Worth knowing

Full table (922 KAR 2:120 Section 2(2)): toddlers 24-36 months 1:10 (group 20); 4-5 years 1:14 (28); school-age 7+ 1:25 before/after school or 1:20 full day (group 30). Maximum group sizes apply only to Type I child-care centers.

Compliance

Background checks

Under 922 KAR 2:280 — which implements the federal CCDBG check (45 CFR 98.43, 42 U.S.C. 9858f) — owners, directors, employees, supervisory persons and anyone with unsupervised contact need, before starting work: a state and national fingerprint-supported criminal check by Kentucky State Police and the FBI (with rap back), Kentucky child abuse/neglect central registry and sex offender registry checks, the national sex offender website, and equivalent checks from every state of residence in the past 5 years. Checks are renewed once every 5-year employment period and redone after a 180-day separation, and no license issues until all checks are complete (922 KAR 2:090).

Mandated reporting

Centers must maintain procedures ensuring staff comply with Kentucky's abuse-reporting law, KRS 620.030, with recognizing-and-reporting training at orientation and a written policy that staff implement those procedures (922 KAR 2:120 §2(3)(b), 2:090). When a director or employee is named as an alleged perpetrator in an accepted report, the center must notify the cabinet within 24 hours and remove the person from direct contact during the investigation.

First aid & CPR

Every center must ensure all staff receive first aid and CPR training (922 KAR 2:120 §7(8)), and at least one person on duty must hold current infant-and-child CPR and infant-and-child first aid certification (adult CPR/first aid for school-age-only centers) (922 KAR 2:090). CPR/first aid hours do not count toward the 15-hour annual training requirement, and renewal follows certificate currency.

Health & safety training

Staff complete 6 hours of cabinet-approved orientation within the first 3 months (federal health/safety topics, child abuse recognition, developmentally appropriate practice), 9 hours of early care and education training in year one, and 15 hours annually thereafter, plus 1.5 hours of pediatric abusive head trauma training in year one and once every 5 years (922 KAR 2:090).

Operations

Supervision rule

Children must be kept within scope of vision and range of voice of staff (school-age children: within scope of vision OR range of voice), and must be accounted for during every movement between locations using name-to-face recognition (922 KAR 2:120 §2(3)(a)). Transportation and field trips carry additional requirements under §14, and an adult staff person must be designated in charge whenever the director is absent.

Record-keeping

Child files include immunization certificates, identifying and health information, emergency contacts, emergency-care authorization and trip permissions, with daily arrival/departure attendance records; staff files hold qualifications, evaluations, TB screening and background-check results, alongside drill logs (monthly fire, quarterly tornado/earthquake), incident and transportation records — all retained five years (922 KAR 2:090, 2:120).

Inspections

Licensees must allow the cabinet unannounced access to the center during all operating hours, with monitoring during preliminary licensure and at least semi-annual inspections during probationary periods; the license, statements of deficiency, corrective action plans and civil penalty notices must be posted conspicuously at the center (922 KAR 2:090).

Worth knowing: Routine inspection frequency for regular licensees is not fixed in the fetched regulations (unannounced access is). Kentucky also certifies family child-care homes under a separate regulation (922 KAR 2:100), not verified in this pass.

Family & home child care

922 KAR 2:100 (Certification of family child-care homes); 922 KAR 2:090 (Child-care center licensure, including Type II centers in the licensee's home)

Certified Family Child-Care Home

No more than 6 unrelated children at any one time; up to 4 related children may be cared for in addition, for a maximum total of 10. An assistant must be present if the provider cares for more than 6 children under age 6, including the provider's own or related children.An assistant must be present when caring for more than 4 infants, including the provider's own or related infants.

Licensed Type II Child-Care Center (in the licensee's home)

The primary residence of the licensee in which child care is regularly provided for 7 but not more than 12 children, including children related to the licensee. Staffing follows the child-care center regulations.

Provider training

Certified family child-care home providers: at least 9 hours of cabinet-approved early care and education training each year (July 1-June 30), including pediatric abusive head trauma training every 5 years.

Worth knowing

Kentucky 'certifies' (rather than licenses) family child-care homes; homes serving 7-12 children in the provider's residence are licensed as Type II child-care centers under the center regulations. Specific Type II staffing ratios and training hours follow the center rules and were not itemized here.