You are here: News Action-plan for quality leap in childcare revealed
Significant boosts in quality in early education and childcare can be achieved with steps costing less than 2 per cent of current Government spending on the sector, a new report from the Family and Childcare Trust finds.
The Family and Childcare Trust’s Putting quality at the heart of the early years report identifies pragmatic opportunities to make sure all families have access to high quality childcare that supports parents to work and gives their children a head start in life. Evidence shows that childcare only helps to improve children’s outcomes at school and beyond if it is high in quality (1). Accordingly, the report calls for the introduction of an Early Excellence Fund to support four aims (2):
- Ensuring there is at least one experienced early years graduate in every setting delivering free childcare, prioritising settings delivering free early education for the most disadvantaged two year olds.
- Providing financial incentives for small childcare settings to provide training and professional development for non-graduate staff.
- Establishing new quality networks to share expertise and link childcare providers with early intervention services.
- Increasing the number of qualified early years special educational needs coordinators (SENCOs) to provide advice and support to childcare settings.
The Family and Childcare Trust estimates the cost needed to meet these aims would be £111 million (3) – a fraction of the £6 billion that will be spent each year on free early education and childcare from 2017.
Claire Harding, Head of Research at Family and Childcare Trust, said:
"Investing in high quality childcare is a rare opportunity to support families’ social mobility and boosts children’s life chances.
"While we welcome Government’s investment in the early years through the 30 hour offer and Tax-Free Childcare scheme, we are concerned that the lack of investment in quality in the early years will mean many families will struggle to access childcare that is good enough in quality to boost their children’s outcomes.
"We call on Government to take a positive and active role in raising the quality of childcare."
The report, funded by Community Playthings, is the latest in a series of studies from the Family and Childcare Trust calling attention to the far-reaching benefits of high quality childcare to not just parents and their children, but to the UK economy and society as a whole as high quality childcare supports parents in the labour market and narrows gender gaps in pay and employment. The report identifies seven key opportunities for improvement:
- Supporting early years staff through better wages and professional development opportunities
- Introducing richer quality metrics for Ofsted inspection and regulation
- Monitoring children’s development effectively in the early years
- Integrating childcare with early help services in children’s centres and elsewhere
- Raising the quality of childcare for children with special educational needs and disabilities
- Nurturing links between childcare settings and parents to support home learning
- Improving the physical environment of settings and promoting physical activ
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Contact: Mark Bou Mansour, Communications and Campaigns Manager. Telephone: 0207 940 7535, mobile: 07538 334 772, email: mark@familyandchildcaretrust.org.
Notes to Editor:
1. Sylva, Kathy and Melhuish, Edward and Sammons, Pam and Siraj-Blatchford, Iram and Taggart, Brenda (2004) The Effective Provision of Pre-School Education (EPPE) Project: Final Report: A Longitudinal Study Funded by the DfES 1997-2004.
2. The proposed Early Excellence Fund consists of four elements:
- An early years graduate fund to pay for training incentives and salary supplements to put an experienced early years graduate in each setting, delivering the two-year-old offer that is not already graduate-led. We estimate that this will require an additional 4,500 early years graduates at an average additional salary cost of £6,000 per graduate, totalling £27million.
- A training fund of £25million offering an annual £5,000 grant to private and voluntary early years settings with a low turnover – with eligibility criteria to be set by local authorities – to support continuing professional development.
- £26million to support graduate-led early years quality networks linking leading high quality settings with other early years providers in each local authority. This figure is based on an estimate of the cost of supporting an average of three networks in each local authority with a dedicated staff and training budget for each network.
- £33million to increase the number of qualified early years special educational needs coordinators (SENCOs) to a ratio of one SENCO per 20 centre-based PVI settings. We estimate the cost of an additional 800 qualified early years area SENCOs at a total of £4.8million in one-off training costs and £28million in ongoing salary costs.
3.The actual cost of schemes to increase the number of early years graduates and qualified SENCOs working in settings would be capped by the number of training places available and initial costs would therefore be lower than these estimates.
About the Family and Childcare Trust
The Family and Childcare Trust aims to make the UK a better place for families. We are a leading national family charity in the field of policy, research and advocacy on childcare and family issues, with over 40 years’ experience. Our on-the-ground work with parents and providers informs our research and campaigns. We focus on the early years and childcare because they are crucial to boosting children’s outcomes throughout life and supporting parents to work.
About Community Playthings
With a fifty-five year history in manufacturing, Community Playthings produces attractive, durable, wooden furniture and play equipment. Their child-friendly designs support children’s creativity, learning, and play in schools and nurseries across the private, voluntary and public sectors.
For more information, visit: www.communityplaythings.co.uk