The present work aims at presenting results of empirical research about the situations of labor and employment in institutions of child education in Brazil, highlighting the case of Belo Horizonte, Capital city of Minas Gerais State, which offers nurseries and preschools and it is representative of Brazilian urban centers. An analysis including documental sources, legislation, statistics, interviews and observations was conducted, aiming at revealing the relations between the typologies of child education establishments and the forms of recruitment, career, salary and working conditions. The situations examined referred to public education institutions (State and Municipal) and private institutions, according to the categories private, communitarian, philanthropic and confessional. The studied establishments were selected, through an intentional sampling procedure, based on location and preferential public attended. Information was also collected from employers - public and private - and from representations of the unions/associations of professionals, in the public and private sectors. The existence of professionals with differentiated status and formation/qualification was evident, as well as a number of modalities of labor and work relations, which reveal a process of precariousness in the professional exercise in child education. Cleavages within the public sector and between public and private sectors reiterate historical inequalities in that field. However, an increased demand for professionalization is observed.
teaching labor; employment situation; child education; preschool education
