Opinion Piece printed in the Mercury Newspaper 26th December 2009
The recent COAG announcements and the sale of the remaining ABC centers to a not for profit consortium has brought Childcare or Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) as it is now known, back into the spotlight for all the right reasons. The announcements are a positive step towards ensuring that the sector provides high quality ECEC, providing great experiences and opportunities for our most precious resource, our children.
For too long the sector has been marked by negativity, corporate collapse, chronic skills shortages and in some areas inconsistent experiences. Whilst the COAG changes will not resolve these issues overnight it is the first time in many years that the sector is looking forward. It is looking towards a brighter future for early year’s professionals, early year’s services and most importantly families and their children. COAG is a significant step forward.
But why do the early years matter?
It matters because 80% of a child’s development occurs before the age of 5 and studies have proven that giving children access to quality ECEC programs assists them with socialisation, instills in children a love for lifelong learning and allows them to reach their full potential.
It matters because it allows families to balance work and family commitments and enables women to return to workforce and have a genuine choice in maintaining a career.
It matters because parents want to know that they are placing their child in a stimulating and caring environment.
It matters because the economists have acknowledged that a quality ECEC sector is crucial in driving increases in labour market productivity.
But importantly it matters because our children deserve it.
The ECEC sector seems to be have been in transition for many years. From a cottage industry propped up by community groups to support working parents it has now grown into a fundamentally important part of our social infrastructure.
To this point in time funding to the early years sector has been woefully inadequate. Australia currently expends a comparatively disappointing 0.4 % of GDP on ECEC services (childcare and preschool combined). This compares with the OECD average of 0.7% with a number of European countries exceeding 1.00%.
The current funding system, designed under the Howard years, creates a market based solution for the early years. Funds are made available through a complex system of rebates and childcare benefits to parents and then indirectly to services combined with a mish-mash of one off program or time based grants. Corporate providers have aggressively targeted the sector and the provision of care has been based purely on economics, and not need.
This market based system of allocating places to the community is fatally flawed as areas of need, but not necessarily financial capacity, will continue to receive patchy and substandard services where more affluent areas will be well and sometimes over catered for.
It is also crucially important that the financial operations of those either running services or owning/operating the facilities that house the service must be made transparent. It is not only important to know that a service can maintain a high quality operation but also that operation is financially sustainable. Parents have a right to know that the centre where they drop off their children every morning will still be operating next week, next month and next year.
The COAG announcement dealing with staff to child ratios (a staged increase has been outlined) and staff qualifications (it will move the sector from 45% of staff having no formal qualifications to the entire workforce holding an appropriate qualification by 2014), is important but disappointingly it has laid a conservative timetable for implementation.
Crucially it has failed to deal with the ever present issue of the wages for early years professionals.
A quality early childhood system has many elements.
• Evidence based child–staff ratios and group sizes
• Early childhood leadership in rooms, centres and services
• Low staff turnover so that continuity of care and consistent delivery of programs can be achieved
• A highly motivated and qualified staff, with access to professional support and development and importantly appropriate wages, conditions and career prospects.
Without the goodwill of staff the sector as it currently stands would collapse. An ECEC system should not be paid for off the back of low paid early childhood professionals. Annual salaries range from 30 to 35 thousand per year, most early years professionals are part-time working between 15 to 37 hours per week. As a modern developed nation we can do better.
The new system articulated by COAG combined with an increase in state based licensing and the increased expectations of parents means that services must respond and work together to professionalise.
The ECEC has come a long way, but it still has far to travel to provide the best environments for our children.
So do the early years matter? Ask any parent how they feel about their child, it matters.
For too long the sector has been marked by negativity, corporate collapse, chronic skills shortages and in some areas inconsistent experiences. Whilst the COAG changes will not resolve these issues overnight it is the first time in many years that the sector is looking forward. It is looking towards a brighter future for early year’s professionals, early year’s services and most importantly families and their children. COAG is a significant step forward.
But why do the early years matter?
It matters because 80% of a child’s development occurs before the age of 5 and studies have proven that giving children access to quality ECEC programs assists them with socialisation, instills in children a love for lifelong learning and allows them to reach their full potential.
It matters because it allows families to balance work and family commitments and enables women to return to workforce and have a genuine choice in maintaining a career.
It matters because parents want to know that they are placing their child in a stimulating and caring environment.
It matters because the economists have acknowledged that a quality ECEC sector is crucial in driving increases in labour market productivity.
But importantly it matters because our children deserve it.
The ECEC sector seems to be have been in transition for many years. From a cottage industry propped up by community groups to support working parents it has now grown into a fundamentally important part of our social infrastructure.
To this point in time funding to the early years sector has been woefully inadequate. Australia currently expends a comparatively disappointing 0.4 % of GDP on ECEC services (childcare and preschool combined). This compares with the OECD average of 0.7% with a number of European countries exceeding 1.00%.
The current funding system, designed under the Howard years, creates a market based solution for the early years. Funds are made available through a complex system of rebates and childcare benefits to parents and then indirectly to services combined with a mish-mash of one off program or time based grants. Corporate providers have aggressively targeted the sector and the provision of care has been based purely on economics, and not need.
This market based system of allocating places to the community is fatally flawed as areas of need, but not necessarily financial capacity, will continue to receive patchy and substandard services where more affluent areas will be well and sometimes over catered for.
It is also crucially important that the financial operations of those either running services or owning/operating the facilities that house the service must be made transparent. It is not only important to know that a service can maintain a high quality operation but also that operation is financially sustainable. Parents have a right to know that the centre where they drop off their children every morning will still be operating next week, next month and next year.
The COAG announcement dealing with staff to child ratios (a staged increase has been outlined) and staff qualifications (it will move the sector from 45% of staff having no formal qualifications to the entire workforce holding an appropriate qualification by 2014), is important but disappointingly it has laid a conservative timetable for implementation.
Crucially it has failed to deal with the ever present issue of the wages for early years professionals.
A quality early childhood system has many elements.
• Evidence based child–staff ratios and group sizes
• Early childhood leadership in rooms, centres and services
• Low staff turnover so that continuity of care and consistent delivery of programs can be achieved
• A highly motivated and qualified staff, with access to professional support and development and importantly appropriate wages, conditions and career prospects.
Without the goodwill of staff the sector as it currently stands would collapse. An ECEC system should not be paid for off the back of low paid early childhood professionals. Annual salaries range from 30 to 35 thousand per year, most early years professionals are part-time working between 15 to 37 hours per week. As a modern developed nation we can do better.
The new system articulated by COAG combined with an increase in state based licensing and the increased expectations of parents means that services must respond and work together to professionalise.
The ECEC has come a long way, but it still has far to travel to provide the best environments for our children.
So do the early years matter? Ask any parent how they feel about their child, it matters.
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