Cost is the first question almost every family asks, and one of the hardest to get a clear answer to. Alberta's child care funding has changed so much in recent years that the figures parents pass around are often badly out of date, and most programs still make you phone in before they will quote you anything at all. Here is a plain-English guide to how preschool and daycare pricing actually works in this province, exactly what we charge at Conifers, and the questions that stop you from comparing apples to oranges.
Alberta prices child care by the month, not the day
This trips up almost everyone. Licensed early learning and child care programs in Alberta bill a flat monthly parent fee based on how many hours per month your child is enrolled for, not a daily rate and not an hourly one. A program will typically define a full-time band and a part-time band, and your fee is the same each month regardless of whether it happens to contain 20 or 22 weekdays.
Those parent fees are set within Alberta's child care affordability framework. Licensed programs that participate receive affordability grant funding, and that funding is applied to bring the published parent fee down. You do not apply for it, claim it, or wait for a rebate. It is already reflected in the number you are quoted. This is why licensed fees today look dramatically lower than what families paid several years ago.
What we charge at Conifers
We publish our fees openly because we think you should be able to plan without booking a phone call. Both rates below already have the affordability grant applied:
- Full-time care (100 or more hours per month): $326.25 per month.
- Part-time care (50 to 99 hours per month): $230.00 per month.
Our doors are open Monday to Friday, 7:00 AM to 6:00 PM, so a family using full days comfortably clears the full-time threshold, while families needing two or three days a week generally land in the part-time band.
There is one other figure worth knowing up front: a one-time, non-refundable registration fee of $150.00 secures your child's place. Enrolment is confirmed once we have both the completed application and that fee.
Subsidy comes on top of that
The affordability grant lowers everyone's fee. The Alberta Child Care Subsidy is separate, income-tested, and applied on top for families who qualify, meaning an eligible family pays less than the published rate, sometimes considerably less. We accept both at Conifers.
Income thresholds and program rules change from year to year, so confirm your own eligibility through Alberta's official child care pages rather than trusting a number you read on a school's website, including ours. What any program can tell you is whether they accept subsidy at all, and how they handle the paperwork. Ask that on your tour.
The costs that never appear on the fee sheet
Two programs quoting the same monthly fee can cost meaningfully different amounts over a year. When you compare, ask each one:
- Is there a registration, enrolment or annual materials fee, and is any of it refundable?
- Are meals provided, or do families send lunch? We provide healthy snacks and families send their child's lunch. Because we are a strict nut-free facility, we ask that no food containing nuts comes into the building.
- What happens on statutory holidays and closure days, and is the monthly fee reduced?
- Is there a late pick-up charge, and how is it calculated?
- Do you charge for days my child is sick or away, and is there a vacation policy?
- Is a deposit required, and how much notice must I give to withdraw?
Why the cheapest quote is not always the lowest cost
Once affordability funding is applied, licensed programs across Calgary cluster within a fairly narrow band. That is genuinely good news, because it means price is no longer the deciding factor. Quality is. When fees are close to identical, what you are really choosing between is educator qualifications, adult-to-child ratios, staff turnover, class size, and whether the program is licensed at all. An unlicensed arrangement may quote less, but it sits outside provincial health, safety and staff-qualification standards and cannot access affordability funding or accept subsidy, which often makes it the more expensive option in the end.
Comparing fairly
Build your comparison on the total annual cost, not the monthly headline: twelve months of fees, plus registration and materials, plus anything you supply yourself, minus any subsidy you qualify for. Then look at what that buys: how many children per educator, what those educators are trained in, and how the room actually feels when you stand in it.
Conifers Montessori Academy is a licensed Montessori preschool, daycare and kindergarten in Saddle Ridge, NE Calgary, serving children 19 months to 6 years from across Skyview Ranch, Cityscape, Redstone, Cornerstone, Savanna, Martindale, Taradale and nearby communities. We are glad to walk any family through fees, subsidy and what a month actually looks like. No pressure, no spreadsheet required.