The Scottish Executive courted controversy a few months ago when it suggested that local authorities did not need to have teachers in all nursery classes. The EIS teachers' union warned that it could mean the quality of provision being 'diluted', with the creation of a postcode lottery in the educational provision available for nursery-age children.
But now, in its response to the National Review of the Early Years and Childcare Workforce, Education Minister Peter Peacock has moved swiftly to reassure the sector that the Executive is committed to ensuring quality leadership in settings and a single qualifications and careers framework for staff.
The catalyst for this is the impending registration from October of the early years and childcare workforce with the Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC). To register with the SSSC a practitioner must hold childcare qualifications equivalent to SVQ level 3. Childminders are still not required to hold a formal qualification and have to register with the Care Commission.
Professional leadership
The review of the Scottish workforce, which was published last month and has been put out for consultation until 22December, found that about 59 per cent of staff hold level 3 qualifications or above, 21 per cent have qualifications below this level and 16 per cent have no formal childcare qualifications. However, in recognition that the level of qualification in the sector is increasing overall, the review said that 51 per cent of this group were working towards attaining qualifications.
The review said that 'critically, the single most significant factor in determining the quality of the centre is the level of qualification of its manager and, to a lesser extent, the level of qualification of the wider workforce'.
Its proposal that settings should be led by a practitioner with an SCQF level 9 qualification (ordinary degree or work-based equivalent) has been endorsed by Mr Peacock - and he has put in place what some in the sector regard as a challenging timetable for its implementation.
'I want the first managers to be able to start continuing professional development routes to the new professional leadership level by September 2008,' he declared in his response to the review. He has asked the SSSC to amend its registration requirements further into the future. From 2011 all lead practitioners or managers will be expected to have attained this leadership level or be able 'to attain it within a specified period'.
Mr Peacock is asking the SSSC to deliver a three-year programme to develop a 'competence-based' qualification and professional development framework in partnership with representatives of employers, the workforce and education and training providers.
Getting the focus right
While she applauds moves to upgrade the skills and qualifications of the workforce, nursery owner Christine Cavanagh questions both the practicalities of getting early-years staff educated to degree level and whether it should be a requirement as 'the care of young children is not necessarily an academic issue'.
She says that some local authorities are reluctant to fund staff seeking qualifications above level 3 and she does not know how the private and voluntary sector will cope with the earnings expectations of graduates.
Liz Gallacher, who runs the Heriot Hill nursery in Edinburgh, says the timetable for implementing the upgrade of qualifications for managers is 'unattainable and needs further consideration'. She, too, is sceptical of its worth, insisting, 'In my experience managers of childcare facilities need a range of qualities. It is questionable whether a focus on academic qualifications is necessary.'
She also notes that the private sector currently supplies 34 per cent of the childcare workforce, 'but is not able to offer the same advantages in pay and conditions of service as the maintained sector. How does the executive propose to address the imbalance in order to develop a shared professional identity across the childcare workforce?'
George MacBride, convenor of the education committee of the EIS, says that the Executive has set 'a very challenging timetable' and emphasises that while work-based routes to degrees will be supported, higher education bodies need to be fully engaged in this process. He adds, 'We would want all qualifications at degree level to be quality assured.'
The Executive has gone some way to meeting the concerns of providers in the PVI sector by providing 5m a year to fund an increase in the advisory floor - the minimum amount local authorities pay partner providers for commissioned pre-school education places - so that pre-five settings can improve training and qualifications.
In a letter to local authority chief executives last month, the Executive admitted that it had become 'increasingly apparent that the level of funding set by the advisory floor does not meet the costs for partner providers of delivering a quality pre-school education service'. In future the minimum local authorities will be expected to pay for nursery education sessions in a PVI setting will be 1,250 per child in 2006-07 - a 20.5 per cent increase on the 2005-06 figure of 1,037 per child.
The Executive letter stated, 'For the avoidance of doubt, ministers are looking to local authorities to make use of these additional resources to increase the funds and support given to partner providers, in particular to enable further investment in their staff as a means of improving quality of provision.' An Executive spokes-man confirmed that money could be used by providers for additional training or increased salaries.
Linda Kinney, head of learning and development with responsibility for early years and schools in Stirling, welcomes the review as 'very clear, well informed and going to the heart of all the core issues'. She says that the Executive's workforce development fund has been 'highly significant in upskilling the workforce'.
She says Stirling council operates an 'incentive-based model' in distributing more than the advisory floor, with different rates depending on whether partner providers meet criteria to improve quality.
The council, she says, already has 'a very well defined professional development programme' called Early Childhood Educators which, as the title suggests, recognises the professional status of nursery staff.
She explains, 'We have a career structure so anyone coming out of college can work their way up to become head of an early years setting in Stirling and we have set out career pathways to do that. We have had people who have gone on from being nursery nurses to get degree qualifications and become heads of centres. That has been supported by the authority, sometimes fully funded, sometimes partly funded.'
Qualifications gap
Margaret Dobie, head of pre-five services and childcare in Glasgow, welcomes the review and the ministerial response to it and says her authority has taken major steps to develop a fully qualified workforce and create a coherent careers structure. 'We have managed over the past five years to fund professionals, other than teachers, who are doing a BA in early childhood studies. Recently, a management module has been introduced to allow these people to go on and become managers of services,' she adds.
Carol Ball, chair of the Unison nursery nurse working party which contributed to the review, welcomes its suggestion of a new qualifications structure 'with highly qualified staff at all levels (SCQF levels 9, 8 and 6/7)' but regrets that the executive has not accepted the need to recognise qualifications below lead level. 'The failure to accept the recommendations of the review group will leave a qualifications gap between SCQF9 and SCQF5 - a gap that most nursery nurses are already ready to step into,' she warns.
She also regrets that the review body did not take 'the obvious next step'
and recommend national pay scales to match the proposed qualifications framework and the new descriptions of the roles of the workforce.
While the Executive's proposals have been broadly welcomed, inevitably a central issue in the current consultation will be the level of funding promised and whether it will be sufficient to ensure that PVI providers are really able to improve the training, qualifications and, crucially, pay of their staff.
To access this consultation online, go to www.scotland.gov.uk/view/ views.asp where you can download the questions and e-mail your response to EYCWorkforceReview@ scotland.gsi.gov.uk
Timetable for change
* Work to create an integrated qualifications and professional development framework to start this month (September) and be completed by September 2007
* Programmes offering the new qualifications and professional development for leaders to be in place by September 2008
* Programmes for those entering and progressing through the workforce by September 2009
* A toolkit explaining the progression routes for early years and childcare workers by September 2009
* From this year 5 million extra per year to fund an increase in the advisory floor used to inform local authority decisions about the cost of providing pre-school places
* A ministerial commitment long-term for all centres providing quality services to be funded on a similar basis
