With the goal of a fairer and faster allocation of daycare places, ZEW – Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research has developed KitaMatch since 2017, a procedure that enables a transparent, fair and fast allocation, in which the preferences of parents and daycare centres are optimally matched. In the meantime, the procedure is being used successfully in several municipalities.

After it was shown in the last years that the procedure developed by ZEW creates a considerable added value for all parties involved, it is now a matter of making it available to the municipalities and daycare centres throughout Germany for free and independent use.

For this purpose, ZEW, with the financial support of the Bertelsmann Foundation, is developing a software manual that is publicly accessible on a web-based basis for non-commercial use. This manual consists of various documents that map the entire process of allocating places, explaining the individual process steps for each of the target groups involved. For this purpose, the process is presented in detail for the target groups, including daycare centres, providers/youth welfare offices, and IT support. At the same time, relevant documents and programming codes are provided.

Link to the project website: https://kitamatch.com/