NZ HERALD: New legislation before Parliament is raising fears childcare centres may be too bogged down in rules to be innovative. Early Childhood Council chief executive Sue Thorne told 600 delegates at its annual conference in Rotorua yesterday that the Education Amendment Bill applies a one-size-fits-all element to all childcare centres... She said the proposed legislation would have stopped kohanga reo and Steiner centres from starting...
"Too bogged down in rules to be innovative." And so they are. Over the last nine years, and under two different Governments, innovation, professionalism and experienced teaching staff have all been squeezed out of what was once a flourishing and diverse early childhod industry. The latest legislative changes will simply help to finish off what Nick Smith began in 1997 with the forced retraining of early childhood teachers by making all those remaining in the profession administrators rather than teachers.
UPDATE: Sue Thorne's speech to the Early Childhood Council just posted at Scoop.
LINKS: New rules worry early childhood centres - NZ Herald
Athens v Sparta - Peter Cresswell, Free Radical (August, 2000)
Sue Thorne ECC - annual conference speech
TAGS: Education, Politics-NZ, Politics-National
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