Media watch

No sooner had Nursery World gone to press last week warning readers to expect a backlash over the forthcoming Sure Start evaluation findings, than The Guardian ran a lead story exposing 'doubts' over why the programme 'may be failing'. It was backed by a comment by columnist Polly Toynbee that Sure Start remains 'one of the Government's best achievements'. In contrast, the Daily Mail described Sure Start as 'a flop' and 'yet another futile piece of social engineering'. The Guardian ran a full-page report with the headline 'Hidden stress of the nursery age'. A study at the universities of Cambridge and Berlin found levels of the stress hormone cotisol doubled in children during the first nine days of childcare without their mothers present. Some children still exhibited 'chronic mild stress' after five months. Co-researcher Professor Michael Lamb said this did not mean childcare was bad for children. But he advised that nurseries provide them with regular rest periods to help cortisol levels fall and to let parents stay at nursery for the first week.