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LAUNCH RELEASE
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LINDA MITCHELL SPEECH
5 July, 2005
Good
evening everyone. Thank you for inviting me to the launch of the
Early Education Federation.
Congratulations to everyone involved in this new beginning for you
all.
For
over two decades your organisation - under an old alias - has made a
significant contribution to the lives of countless young New
Zealanders. You've played an important and valuable part in helping
form new policy for early childhood education and in particular you
have given strong support to the early childhood education strategic
plan and its implementation.
We can
all be proud of the progress that has been made in early childhood
education, and I would like to thank you personally for positive and
constructive contribution.
As you
celebrate your new organisation tonight, it's worth looking at the
huge progress we are making in early childhood education through the
strategic plan.
We can
all be proud to say Pathways to the Future: Ngā Huarahi Arataki
is changing the face of early childhood education in New Zealand.
Changes
ushered in by the strategic plan ultimately mean a
seamless education system from birth to 19 years will be available
for every young New Zealander.
Quality
early childhood education will quite rightly be recognised as having
a vital role in establishing a strong foundation for a child’s
learning.
And
innovative professional learning will be backed by an excellent
institutional framework as the changes we are delivering through the
strategic plan take hold.
Substantial government funding has enabled the progress we have made
for accessible and affordable quality early childhood education.
Our
significant new investment of $152 million over the
next four years from this year’s Budget means total expenditure on
early childhood education in 2008-09 will be $694 million, an
increase of 140 per cent since we came to government in 1999.
Just
last Friday the extra new funding for running an early childhood
centre began.
This
was a significant milestone on the road toward providing a funding
system that recognises and encourages the different needs and
strengths across the sector; a system that is transparent and
more
responsive to the cost of operating different types of services.
The new
funding system and recent increases to funding rates mean a
service’s child-hour funding rates can only increase between now and
2007; even where a service has few registered teachers it can
continue to receive the former Rate 2 until 2007.
Our
goal now and with your support is to continue improving the quality
of early childhood education and ensure participation rates keep
climbing.
We've
made great gains in participation already – enrolments have
increased by nearly 10,000 in the past two years.
To continue this
trend we need to provide good information about the benefits of
early childhood education and ensure all families have options that
suit their needs.
The Promoting
Participation Project will continue to support disadvantaged
families who might not otherwise participate in early childhood
education.
Increased funding for
the Discretionary Grants Scheme will ensure new services are
available in areas of need. As a result of Budget 2005 some 55 to 65
more community-based centres will be built over the next four years.
This
will create many more places for youngsters in the lead-up to the
introduction of the 20 hours free early childhood education for all
three and four-year olds in community-based centres in 2007.
On that
note, I must remind you of what my opponents have promised to do to
early childhood education. National has pledged to scrap our
government's commitment to the 20 hours free policy.
This
effectively means that around 86,000 children and their families
will miss out, in order to help pay for that party's tax cuts.
I
believe other cuts are in
store - and
English is preparing the groundwork for this. Why else would you
criticise widely-accepted domestic and international research that
tells us how important quality early childhood education can be for
children's success in education later on.
Why
else would you criticise our government's determination to widen
access to quality early childhood education, and our intention to
improve affordability so more families can take part.
In
contrast, I am sure I do not need to reiterate my own and the
Labour-led government’s continued commitment to early childhood
education, as we
continue our focus on increasing participation in quality,
affordable early childhood education.
Labour's manifesto is still being finalised, but I'd like to signal
some of our current thinking.
On the
quality side, you will be aware that the Ministry of Education
consulted on three options to improve adult: child ratios last year,
and also separately on proposals to improve group sizes in services.
We've
known for a long time that good adult: child ratios are associated
with better outcomes for children, so it was no surprise that the
feedback on this supported making improvements. Feedback on group
sizes told us that, at this stage, change through regulation could
lead to negative outcomes for levels of participation.
Going
forward there is more work being done on both proposals, so I will
be consulting with you further before a decision on ratios is made.
With regards to group sizes, I have deferred a decision until 2009
to allow for more information to be gathered. However, we are
working towards improvements in both these areas for the future.
Another
important focus is improving access. We will be working with
existing early childhood providers to extend services, by either
growing their centres where appropriate or establishing additional
centres on other sites.
Employers, particularly in the state sector, will be encouraged to
establish early childhood education and care facilities on work
sites.
Greater
family and whanau involvement will be encouraged through targeted
education programmes and improved co-ordination with health and
social service agencies.
In
addition, to help ensure services are working to meet the needs of
the families they serve, we will move toward requiring parental and
staff involvement in the governance of early childhood services.
This will include providing them with good information to guide
their input.
We all
know the involvement of parents and whanau can work wonders for
their children’s learning.
Budget
2005 also provided $16 million for Foundations for Discovery,
the new information communications technologies framework for early
childhood education.
This
framework promotes using technology as part of a young child’s
education and is also an administration tool helping services to
streamline their administrative systems.
Seeing the way some of our youngsters are using this
new technology has amazed me - they are taking better digital photos
than me and having great fun using ICT as they learn.
This
year we also released the early childhood education exemplars.
What is really exiting about the exemplars is they
include the voices of parents and whanau, alongside teachers and
children.
This is
a ground breaking and innovative move for early childhood education
in New Zealand and I believe for the rest of the world.
Finally, these are exciting times for early childhood education up
and down the country. We can take a moment tonight to proudly chalk
up the improvements we've made to date, before we get back to work
and put our collective minds to charting the course for the future.
I look
forward to continuing to working alongside you as we seek to improve
even more the education our under-fives receive.
Again
warm congratulations on your new future as the Early Education
Federation.
Thank
you.
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