Comprehensive Background Checks

Questions and Answers about the Comprehensive Background Checks Process

The Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG) Act requires states and territories to have requirements, policies, and procedures in effect to conduct comprehensive background checks for all licensed and license exempt child care providers.

Kids in school raising their hands

In Delaware, comprehensive background checks are required for:

  • Applicant(s)/owner(s)
  • Family and large family child care providers and their adult household members
  • Center, family and large family substitutes
  • Child care center staff administrators, teachers and caregivers
  • Contracted special services persons who will be alone with children
  • Janitors
  • Cooks
  • Volunteers
  • All other employees or contractors working in a child-serving entity who may not regularly engage with children but whose position gives them opportunity for unsupervised access to children.

General Questions & Answers (Q&A)

Below are some Questions & Answers related to comprehensive background checks for individuals in child-serving entities in Delaware.

What staff must have comprehensive background checks in Licensed Child Care Centers?

All child care center staff and volunteers, age 18 and over, who have direct access to children or who have the opportunity for unsupervised access to children.

Who must have a background check in Licensed Family Child Care and Licensed Large Family Child Care homes?

The licensed family child care provider, staff, all household members (age 18 and over), any substitutes, and anyone with direct access to children or who has the opportunity for unsupervised access to children. In both types of care, anyone with direct access to children or who has the opportunity for unsupervised access to children needs to be fingerprinted.

Who must have a comprehensive background check in a License Exempt Relative Child Care Home?

The relative child care provider and all household members (age 18 and over). *Note, relative care providers are not required to complete out of state checks.

What staff must have comprehensive background checks in License Exempt Summer Camps that serve children receiving child care assistance funds (POC)?

All camp employees and volunteers, age 18 and over, and anyone who will have direct access to children or who has the opportunity for unsupervised access to children.

What is included in a comprehensive background check?

Individuals requiring a comprehensive background check must be fingerprinted at a specified Delaware State Police location. The comprehensive background check includes:

  • Delaware Criminal Record Check (SBI)
  • National Criminal Record Check (FBI)
  • Delaware Child Protection Registry Check
  • Delaware Sex Offenders Registry Check
  • National Sex Offenders Registry Check

Additionally, individuals residing out of state or who have resided outside of Delaware in the past 5 years (except license-exempt relative care providers) must complete the following additional checks in those states:

  • State Criminal History Check
  • State Child Abuse and Neglect Registry Check
  • State Sex Offender Registry Check (This check will be completed by the Criminal History Unit)
  1. Checks must be done prior to or when an individual becomes employed at a new facility, or starts volunteering. Background check results are not transferrable to other child care facilities.
  2. Checks are required at least once every five years when employment is maintained with the same provider.

What is the cost?

Child care providers working in Delaware are not charged for the fingerprinted criminal check or the Delaware Child Abuse Registry check.

However, there are additional checks required of Delaware providers living outside the state or who have lived outside the state in the previous 5 years. There may be costs associated with those checks. Fees are determined by each state.

What are the grounds for denying employment or licensure based on your comprehensive background check?

  1. Prohibited criminal convictions and prohibited child abuse and neglect substantiations with time parameters as designated under 31 Delaware Code, Section 309, the Child Care Development Block Grant Act of 2014, and 16 Delaware Code, Section 923.
  2. Ineligible criminal convictions and child abuse and neglect substantiations other than those that are prohibited shall be reviewed in consideration of other criteria below. In that case, a review will be conducted by the DSCYF, Criminal History Unit. A determination will be made using the following:
    • DELACARE Regulations – Background Checks For Child-Serving Entities
    • DSCYF, Criminal History Unit Decision Making Protocol

Persons determined ineligible or prohibited will be sent a letter informing them of the ineligible or prohibited offense and if they choose, how to request an administrative review of the determination.

Q&A for Child Care Providers Working in Delaware and Living in Delaware

These Questions & Answers will help individuals working in Delaware and have lived in Delaware during the entire past 5 years, understand the comprehensive background checks process.

How do you start the process for obtaining a comprehensive background check in Delaware?

Step 1) A center administrator, large family child care provider, or family child care provider logs into the Delaware ECE Portal, generates a background check form, and prints the pre-filled background check form for an applicant.

Background Check Form Guide

Background Check First Time User Video

If you have already created a profile for the Delaware ECE Portal:

Sign In Video

Forgot Your Password Video

If you need to create a profile for the Delaware ECE Portal:

Sign up Video

My Early Childhood Career Journey Video

 

What are the next steps in the process for obtaining a comprehensive background check in Delaware?

Step 2) The applicant completes, signs, and dates the form and returns it to the Criminal History Unit (CHU) via email: DSCYF_CHU@delaware.gov or via fax: (302) 633-5191. 

Step 3) Upon receipt of the completed form, CHU will email the person the IdentoGO Service Code and No Charge Authorization Code. 

Step 4) The applicant signs up for an IdentoGO appointment online using the service code and provides the no-charge authorization code for payment. The IdentoGo helpline phone number is 1-844-539-5541 for any issues setting up your appointment.

Step-by-step guide on How to Register for your Appointment
Step-by-step video on How to Register for your Appointment
List of appointment locations

Step 5) The applicant attends their selected, in-person appointment.

What are the final steps in a comprehensive background check in Delaware?

Step 6) CHU receives the background check results and sends an eligibility determination or provisional eligibility notification to the CHU contact. Individuals only receive a determination letter via mail (sent to the address provided on the form) when they are either determined ineligible or prohibited from employment.

What website can you visit to read about obtaining a certified Delaware Criminal History?

Q&A for Child Care Providers Working in Delaware, Living or Has Lived in Other States Within the Past 5 Years

If a child care provider is living, or has lived in another state in the past 5 years, they need to get the state specific background checks from each of those states. This is in addition to the Delaware checks. However, relative child care providers are excluded from the out-of-state requirement.

What are the required out-of-state background checks?

For the state the individual is living or for all states the individual has lived in during the past 5 years:

  • State Criminal History Check
  • State Child Abuse and Neglect Registry Check
  • State Sex Offender Registry Check (This check will be completed by the Criminal History Unit)

Whose responsibility is it to get the information from each state?

The individual who is living, or has lived, in another state in the past 5 years must obtain the following out-of-state checks:

  • State Criminal History Check
  • State Child Abuse and Neglect Registry Check

The final check is completed by Delaware’s Criminal History Unit (CHU).

  • State Sex Offender Registry Check

Where can information for out-of-state checks be found?

Refer to the following website for the Interstate Child Care Background Check Contact List: https://childcareta.acf.hhs.gov/resource/child-care-subsidy-criminal-background-check-contact-list-0

What does a child care provider do with the out-of-state background check information received? 

The individual must immediately give a copy of the out-of-state check results to their employer/licensed child care provider or license exempt summer camp provider.

The employer/licensed child care provider or license exempt summer camp provider must submit the results of the out-of-state background checks to:

DSCYF, Criminal History Unit
The Concord – Hagley Building,
3411 Silverside Road,
Wilmington, De 19810

OR

via email: DSCYF_CHU@delaware.gov
via fax: 302-633-5191
phone: 302-892-4525

Q&A for Child Care Providers Working in Other States, Living or Has Lived in Delaware the Past 5 Years

When a child care provider works in another state but is living, or has lived, in Delaware in the past 5 years, they need to get background checks from Delaware.

What is the procedure to get a Delaware Criminal History Check?

This is handled by the Delaware State Police – State Bureau of Investigation (SBI).

Details can be found on the following website: https://dsp.delaware.gov/obtaining-a-certified-criminal-history/.

Click the button for out-of-state residents for further information. The cost is $72.00.

What is the procedure to get a Delaware Sex Offender Registry Check?

Search the online registry. Follow the directions provided by the state for which you are requesting the check. https://sexoffender.dsp.delaware.gov/

What is the procedure to get a Delaware Child Abuse and Neglect Registry Check?

The Department of Services for Children, Youth and Their Families, Criminal History Unit manages the Delaware Child Protection Registry Portal.  The out-of-state employer or child care individual registers on the Portal and completes a request to have a Delaware check completed.  The results are available in the Portal to the requesting party within 15 days.

https://childprotectionregistry.delaware.gov/. The cost is $14.00.

My Child DE is a user-friendly website that brings together resources to help families, providers and other caretakers make informed choices for the children of Delaware. The goal of My Child DE is to help these groups feel welcome, informed and empowered to engage, learn and take the next steps needed to support children.