Nursery World - To the point - Speak up for children

It's difficult to know where best to focus these words, since I am still reeling from so many of the misconceived suggestions in Elizabeth Truss's proposals.

By now, I hope she will have been taken aback by widespread outrage responding to issues such as:

proposals on adult-child ratios which would leave the youngest children unsupported and unsafe

regulating floor space as a 'trivial' matter

taking two-year-olds into schools to be 'taught' by primary teachers

establishing Ofsted as the sole arbiter of quality, replacing local authority teams who know settings and the community well with Ofsted inspectors who, experience shows, are highly variable.

Changes to workforce qualifications remain muddied. Why assume that early years teachers without QTS would gain higher status and reward than early years professionals currently have? Would childminders who are part of an agency be seen as babysitters, with less emphasis on a well-trained professional role? And will the Government grasp the challenge of a timetable to insist on highly qualified staff in all settings?

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