Licensed Infant Care in Sainte Catherine, QC

Infant Care in Sainte Catherine

Sainte-Catherine sits on the south shore of the St. Lawrence in the Roussillon MRC, about twenty minutes from downtown Montreal when the Champlain bridge cooperates. MapleCub lists seven licensed childcare centres here. All seven are installations rather than home-based services, which is worth knowing if you were hoping for a milieu familial close by, because the nearest ones are registered in Candiac and Delson instead. Every one of the seven takes toddlers and preschoolers, and six of them are licensed for infants as well, which is stronger coverage at the youngest end than a list this short usually manages.

What to know about childcare in Sainte Catherine

Ratings are thin. They also lean average, because four of the seven have collected at least three Google reviews and across those four the mean sits at 4.13, which is below the Quebec figure of 4.52 that MapleCub calculates from more than eighteen hundred rated centres. Le Petit Soleil Ste-Catherine holds the top mark at 4.8. That comes from four reviews. Read it as a hint.

Five of the seven are subventionnees. Parents there pay the provincial reduced contribution rather than a market rate set by the operator, which for most families is the single biggest line in the household budget and the thing that decides the shortlist before anything else does. Two are not: Academie Prescolaire les Petites Etoiles de la Rive and La Petite Lune Ste-Catherine. Both charge full fees, and Quebec's refundable tax credit for childcare expenses is what brings the net cost down instead, refunded the following spring rather than deducted at the door.

CPE Soleil Souriant and Garderie Privee Internationale Ste-Catherine round out the list alongside Cpe la Boite a Bizous and Garderie les Bouts de Papier. Waitlists run through the Portail d'inscription aux services de garde. Register there first, put down more than one choice, and expect the subsidized places to move a good deal more slowly than the private ones.