Rethinking early childhood workforce sustainability in the context of Australia's early childhood education and care reforms

Tamara Cumming,Sandie Wong,Jennifer Sumsion

doi:10.1007/s40723-015-0005-z

Tamara Cumming, Sandie Wong + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1007/s40723-015-0005-z

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Abstract

Early childhood workforce sustainability is an important issue, with implications for children, families and national productivity, as well as for educators themselves. Yet, in many national contexts, workforce challenges continue to undermine efforts to support sustainability. In this article, we evaluate efforts to address early childhood workforce challenges in the Australian context, where extensive early childhood reforms are underway. We argue that attempts to address workforce challenges in current policy initiatives are limited and may be insufficient for sustaining the early childhood workforce in the long term. Given the critical role that the early childhood workforce plays in Australia’s early childhood reform agenda, we then consider how workforce sustainability could be rethought and other possibilities generated for addressing entrenched workforce challenges. We conclude by arguing that greater attention to the everyday politics of educators’ practice, along with the forces shaping these milieux, may be a way of generating new possibilities for supporting workforce sustainability.

Highlights

Childhood educatorsa [referred to hereafter as ‘educators’], and the workforce they comprise, are critical to ‘universally accessible, high-quality ECE provision’ (International Labour Organization 2014, 6) that best supports good outcomes for children, families and economic productivity (Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development [OECD] 2006; Gable et al 2007)
Given what is known about effective approaches to workforce sustainability, we argue that the approaches offered by the Australian Workforce Strategy and initiatives are limited and may prove insufficient to sustain the early childhood workforce in the long term
Workforce challenges Some of the challenges relating to Australia's early childhood workforce sustainability are consistent with experiences in other national contexts, in particular: pay that is incommensurate with the skill and responsibility required of educators, educators perceiving that there is a lack of public recognition of their professionalism and, that work in other sectors offers the same pay but is perceived to be less stressful (Productivity Commission 2011)

Summary

Introduction

Childhood educatorsa [referred to hereafter as ‘educators’], and the workforce they comprise, are critical to ‘universally accessible, high-quality ECE provision’ (International Labour Organization 2014, 6) that best supports good outcomes for children, families and economic productivity (Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development [OECD] 2006; Gable et al 2007). Workforce challenges Some of the challenges relating to Australia's early childhood workforce sustainability are consistent with experiences in other national contexts, in particular: pay that is incommensurate with the skill and responsibility required of educators, educators perceiving that there is a lack of public recognition of their professionalism and, that work in other sectors offers the same pay but is perceived to be less stressful (Productivity Commission 2011).

Results

Conclusion