The commitment to improve the quality of early childhood care and education is a key priority for my Department and a number of reforms in key areas to enhance the quality of the service provided are being progressed. These include the introduction of minimum qualification standards for those working directly with children in the pre-school sector.
Amendments have been made to the Child Care Act 1991 to underpin the proposed reforms and Regulations giving effect to these legislative changes are expected to be published shortly. The new Regulations will impose qualification requirements of a minimum Level 5 award on the National Qualifications Framework (NFQ) in early childhood care and education for all staff working in early years services (no requirement currently exists). This requirement applies from September 2014 in the case of new services, and from September 2015 in the case of existing services. In addition, the minimum qualification requirement for pre-school leaders delivering the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme will be increased from a Level 5 award to a Level 6, from the same dates.
In light of the proposed timeframes for the introduction of new qualification requirements, the Department has sought to work with the childcare sector to accelerate the process for training and upskilling staff and improving the quality of care delivered to children. Some €0.9 million was provided to support a training programme in 2013 to provide support to staff who are seeking to meet the qualification requirements.
In March of this year, the Learner Fund was launched. This Fund, which has an allocation of €3 million over the two years 2014 and 2015 and is sufficient to support all eligible applicants, is designed to support existing childcare staff to up-skill to meet new qualification requirements. The Learner Fund is being administered by Pobal, with the assistance of local City and County Childcare Committees. The fund closed for applications from childcare staff at the end of April this year but it is hoped to make further funding available later this year which will provide for additional places for staff seeking training support.
Working with children in an early childhood care and education setting is a professional role which requires the achievement of core skills and knowledge including Child Development 0-6, Early Learning Theory and Practice and Child Health and Welfare as well as a supervised practicum. For the purposes of my Department's childcare programmes, it recognises certain qualifications as being equivalent to NFQ qualifications for its purposes. However, the content must include the topics listed.
In relation to childcare services providing the free pre-school provision under the ECCE programme, it is currently a requirement that the pre-school leader hold a major award at level 5 or an equivalent qualification. Completion of part of a degree programme does not meet the requirement for a major award. It is the responsibility of childcare services participating in the programme to submit to my Department documentary evidence that the pre-school leader in the service holds the required qualifications. All applications will be evaluated and the service advised of the outcome.
