Government cut backs and policy changes affecting early childhood education

Here at ELHQ we strive to offer quality free teaching resources for parents, primary schools and nurseries across the world. We work with teachers on a day to day basis and have an active interest in early childhood education, particularly in the UK. It goes without saying that these are difficult times economically and tough decisions need to be made. Nevertheless it is important that consideration is given to the short and long term implication of policy decisions. The danger is that short term thinking and penny pinching could actually result in long term problems and underachievement leading to negative social and emotional problems for individuals and extra financial burdens for the state. The importance of early years experiences is highlighted in the Effective Pre-School and Primary and Secondary Education (EPPSE) report (a comprehensive study funded by the Department for Children, Schools and Families). The EPPSE clearly demonstrates that the quality and nature of early childhood education has an acute influence on a child’s educational achievement and their future social, emotional and behavioural well-being.

With this in mind I’d like to run through a few particular concerns which I know are shared by many. I’m aware that there are no easy answers when dealing with budget constraints, but I just wanted to highlight some issues that need to be debated:

1) By removing the obligation for Sure Start Children’s Centres to provide full daycare in the most disadvantaged areas the process of returning to work or education for many parents will be made extremely difficult. Similarly, by no longer ring-fencing many early-years grants (despite largely protecting school budgets) young children could be left in a vulnerable situation at a point in their lives when they are forming so many aspects of their future self.

2) There seems to be a distinct shift towards an early years system with an emphasis on targeting individual families who are disadvantaged rather than on universal service provision. The coalition government’s Education Bill published yesterday proposes to give parents of disadvantaged two-year-olds a right to 15-hours free Early Years provision a week. This is not in itself a bad thing but it could lead to a 2 tiered education system where children from a very early age do not get the benefit of mixing with others from different backgrounds.

3) Removing the requirement for Sure Start Children’s Centres to hire a member of staff with both Early Years Professional and Qualified Teacher status could dilute the quality of early childhood education. It is difficult to see exactly what the removal of this requirement actually achieves. I’m sure there are some reasons beyond the limited amount of bureaucracy that it would dispense with, but those reasons are not particularly obvious to me.

Peter