Negotiating Quality in Children s Services Jennifer Sumsion Charles

Negotiating Quality in Children’s Services Jennifer Sumsion Charles Sturt University What Matters in Early Childhood Symposium ARACY-SCU October 29, 2007

: FEDERAL LABOR’S PLAN FOR HIGH QUALITY CHILD CARE JOINT STATEMENT GIVING PARENTS PEACE OF MIND

• Tough national childcare quality standards including a quality improvement system that assesses centres from A-E and regular unannounced spot checks • Federal Labor will work with child care providers, early childhood experts and parents to develop agreed detailed standards to be implemented from July 1 2008

As a sector, how might we respond? • What would we like ‘working with’ to entail? • What do we think ‘agreed detailed standards’ should look like?

Currently • Two–tiered regulatory environment (Statebased Licensing and QIAS) • Focused respectively on structural and process aspects of quality • Compliance with up to 86 legal and statutory requirements

But is (ensuring) quality really this ‘straightforward’? : Do we want more of the same or do we want to think about regulating for quality differently?

• Quality is a socio-cultural and political construct rather than an ‘objective reality’ (Dahlberg, Moss and Pence, 2007) • ‘Quality’ is too readily reduced to what can be ‘measured’; what is most important often can’t be measured • Structural and process elements of quality are important but insufficient (Fenech et al, 2007) • Regulatory frameworks can promote particular ways of thinking about quality at the expense of others (Fenech, 2007)

Study 1 (Bown & Sumsion, 2005) • Early childhood teachers’ experiences of the NSW Regulation • In-depth interviews with 3 early childhood teachers • Arts-informed enquiry

Study 2 (Fenech, Sumsion & Goodfellow, 2004 -06) FOCUS Teachers’ perceptions of the impact of the LDC regulatory environment on their capacity to provide high quality education and care INVOLVED (i) State wide survey (n=212) (ii) Focus groups (56 participants) (iii) In-depth interviews (n= 16) Supported by the ARC, NSW IEU and WSROC

PARTICIPANT PROFILE § Female, experienced § Employed as a director/centre manager § Primarily from the not-for-profit sector (70%) FINDINGS § Participants believed that we need a regulatory framework § The regulatory environment the most commonly cited source of job dissatisfaction for participants (cited by 60%), exceeding lack of respect / recognition (54%) and lack of resources (52%) § The more experienced participants were, the less satisfied they were with the regulatory environment

“A double edged sword” A regulatory framework is essential but there are many unintended negative effects

Major concerns of participants • impact on time • impact on professional autonomy • overly risk oriented > can inhibit quality and professional practice

Theme 1: Regulation can be ineffective in protecting children from risk Narrows the parameters of what is deemed to constitute quality and thus the parameters in which government is expected to act so as to be seen to be effectively promoting quality in ECEC services. E. g. reinforces a ‘need’ for regulation, whilst deflecting attention away from industrial concerns − low wages, teacher shortages, high staff turnover − that threaten quality standards of care. Often overlooks children’s rights and interests.

Theme 2: Regulation can promote simplistic approaches to quality that fail to appreciate the complexities of professional decision-making One validator from NCAC felt that we weren’t meeting the sun protection policy. It was in April so it wasn’t particularly hot and we had lots of shaded areas. All the activities were in the shade. All the kids had hats and sunscreen on. But because we’d stayed outside a bit longer than what it said in our policy, he wouldn’t budge and he marked us down because of it.

Theme 3: Greater emphasis on risks to institutions than on realistic assessments of risks to children At my last centre I tied ribbons around the tree. The children could climb and touch the ribbons and then come down. …They all knew they couldn’t go any higher. And my Do. CS’ advisor let me do that… But now if there’s anything over 50 cm and no soft fall, it’s ‘Sorry, we can’t have that’. Rather than reflect ‘well, how are we going to get round this? How are we going to deal with this in a beneficial way for the children, for the staff, the regulations, for accreditation, for everything’ … I think the interpretation is becoming more prescriptive… they’re interpreting it in a more black and white way

Theme 4: Addressing institutional risk involves a ‘blame game’ Early childhood teachers become a potential “problem” and a threat to be ’managed’ via surveillance via spot checks, licensing visits, validation processes and extensive documentation– much of which is perceived to be for audit purposes rather than for the benefit of children or staff. It’s just like going to a dentist who says that ‘I have just sterilised these instruments, would you sign off that you have seen me sterilise them?

Theme 5: Can lead to unnecessary standardisation / ‘normalisation’ Practices can become ‘normalised’ when require centres are required to demonstrate the same ‘safe’ practices. You can feel tied by them (regulatory requirements). Like you can have these great ideas and great visions of what you want to do, then you have to say ‘oh, hang on a minute, are we allowed to do that? Can we do that? ’ So it …. can pull you back

Theme 6: Can promote fear and suspicion, rather than collaboration and trust If you engage in risky pedagogy where you are talking about stuff that is curriculum on the edge, a family can make a complaint and that is it. Your career is ended. So you’re narrowing the possibilities for yourself and for teachers in an appalling way by a regulatory environment that does not trust teachers.

THE CHALLENGE : To devise a regulatory system that …

• Is more than a “control system that provides layers of pseudo-comfort about risk” (Power, 2004, p. 50) • Recognises and values ‘professional wisdom’ and professional autonomy (Goodfellow, 2003) • Has robust, enforceable minimum standards but isn’t pitched at the lowest common denominator • Encourages innovative practice and recognises that quality involves some risk taking

Where to next? Paraphrased from bel hooks (1994, p. 207) [Children’s services are] a place where paradise can be created. [The centre], with all its limitations, remains a location of possibility. In that field of possibility, we have the opportunity to … collectively imagine new ways to move beyond boundaries, to transgress. This is education as the practice of freedom.

Study 3 (Harrison, Press, Sumsion, Fenech & Bowes, 2008 -10) • What do NSW long day care centres rated high quality by NCAC, LSAC, and the Child Care Choices Study have in common? How do they differ? • What do EC staff perceive to be the strengths and limitations of the new accreditation system? • How can we value the depth of staff expertise in high quality centres, and promote the innovative practice and risk-taking needed for ongoing quality improvement? • What might a system look like that is based around expert practitioners from ‘light house’ centres working with other centres to support ongoing quality improvement?