Markham mother Carey Chan thought she was sitting pretty. She was almost finished her maternity leave and felt lucky to secure places for her two young sons in a local Montessori program until the end of June, even though it would cost $10,000.

Then COVID-19 struck.

The child-care program, like all the others in the province, closed. But the final blow struck when she learned the for-profit program did not give refunds.

That’s when she got mad.

“Some daycares and Montessori schools are offering rebates and credits, but not all,” Chan said Wednesday. “If the government is mandating all child-care centres to close, why is there a difference in the treatment of parents?”

Her family is now facing the same significant financial loss as many other parents of children in daycare who have seen their centres shuttered over the past week due to the COVID-19 crisis.

Chan decided to do something about it. She launched a petition, urging the Ford government to make daycare programs give refunds or credits. In just two days, more than 500 parents have signed Chan’s petition on change.org.

“For my family, since we have two kids, we’re looking at a loss of $10,000,” said Chan, whose sons are age 5 and 18 months.

“One month for one child costs $1,500. We are talking about three months, along with extended care that we have prepaid until June. And it’s a lot of money,” she added.

Many parents with children enrolled in private Montessori child-care programs, which are modelled on an individual-based teaching theory from Italian physician Maria Montessori, pay fees in advance, Chan noted. Others pay by debit or postdated cheque and often are loathe to stop payment on the cheque for fear of losing their space when the program reopens.

“The daycares seem to be telling parents they can’t offer refunds or credits because of their financial obligations,” Chan said.

But Chan, whose 18-month-old son Karson had barely attended two weeks before the program closed in the wake of Ontario’s state of emergency declaration, doesn’t buy it. That’s because she is opening her own 126-student Montessori school this summer and from her research she knows for-profit daycares are well placed to weather a shutdown.

The federal and provincial governments just announced business relief packages, including interest-free loans, wage subsidies and employment insurance (EI) for workers, which will go a long way to support centres and their staff, she said.

Major banks are also helping with mortgage relief of up to six months.

“It’s amazing that all of this help is going to businesses and workers. But we are hearing nothing for parents,” Chan said.

The Nova Scotia government has said it will compensate daycares and staff so parents aren’t on the hook for fees while programs are closed. But so far, no other province has stepped up.

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Earlier this week, a spokesperson for Ontario Education Minister Stephen Lecce said the province will provide “more clarity on child care as a whole in the coming days.”

Child care advocates are also calling on all provinces to implement emergency child care for essential workers and introduce special financial measures to keep shuttered daycares afloat, pay staff and protect parents.

“A lot of parents are OK waiting for three weeks,” said Chan, who consulted local parent Facebook groups and ran a small poll, before launching the petition. “But it looks like this might go on for some time, and a lot of families are going to lose a lot of money.”

Ontario parents pay the highest child care fees in the country, with median fees for toddlers (age 18 months to 2 1/2 years) in Toronto topping $1,400 a month.