Opinion: Editor's view - NVQs need to be the gateway to professional childcare

Nursery World regularly receives comments from managers and owners that people gaining an NVQ qualification are often not adequately prepared for working in a nursery. Some do not have the underpinning knowledge necessary, some struggle with literacy and numeracy. There are suspicions that candidates are passed before they are ready so that targets are met, and examples of assessors practically writing students' assignments for them!

All this leads to the 'skills gap' Ms Edmond refers to, giving employers the burden of training newly-qualified staff to an acceptable level. She points out that her managers plead 'Can't we bring back the NNEB?'

Many NVQ students will, of course, go on to be very good practitioners, perhaps taking higher-level qualifications. But there is no doubt that providers will struggle to deliver the EYFS if the standard qualification for early years workers is not producing enough staff of sufficient calibre.

One of Ms Edmonds' recommendations was for entry level criteria for those wanting to take NVQs, to stop the image of childcare being a home for the least academically able. Some will disagree, on the grounds that very able people could be excluded. However, there is a difference between, say, a mature woman with children, life skills and experience, and a 16-year-old disaffected schoolgirl who thinks she will be doing a spot of babysitting. Childcare must be seen as a worthwhile profession.