Community Legal Centres NSW (CLCNSW) recently launched its Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP) in an effort to address the significant barriers Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples face in accessing justice. Continue Reading →
According to the latest statistics from the Productivity Commission, the early childhood education and care (ECEC) sector collectively employs around 140,000 people, of which only 3 per cent are male.
That’s just 4,200 men across the whole country. Practically an endangered species.
As director of Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace, Helen Conway is leading the charge to address gender bias in the workplace.
She talks to Rattler about her efforts to ensure that equality becomes a reality.
Rattler talks to a DEC preschool, a community-based service and private long day care centre about the long and winding road to quality improvement. By Ingrid Maack.
The past three years has been an era of rapid change and reflection with children’s services using the reform agenda as a road map to raise quality and drive continuous improvement. Even while still in its draft form, many services began engaging with the National Quality Framework (NQF)—turning the mirror inwards, so to speak, and sparking a spirit of self-study and reflection that is effectively reshaping the sector.
In a female-dominated profession known for employing women in their childbearing years, family-friendly staffing arrangements are a priority at the University of New South Wales’ three long day care centres—Kanga’s House, The House at Pooh Corner and Tigger’s Honeypot.
Jemma Carlisle, general manager of Early Years@UNSW University Services, says educators at the recently amalgamated group of UNSW services are offered flexible work arrangements including 36-weeks paid maternity leave (for staff employed for fives years or more) and 26 weeks for staff employed for less than five years.
Corporatised institutions have a stronger presence in most areas of everyday life in Australia. With the privatisation of many government services over the past decade, is there a place for corporate competitiveness and profit motivations in children’s services? Eddy Jokovich looks at the key issues in the political debate about corporatising childcare and why community-based services need to be concerned. Continue Reading →
