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he pānui kōhungahunga

He Pānui Kōhungahunga
Issue 77

16 March 2023
Home
/
he pānui kōhungahunga

He Pānui Kōhungahunga

Issue 77
16 March 2023
FOREWORD

Kia ora koutou,

With colder weather comes the risk of illness spreading, so now is a good time to get on to both flu vaccinations and measles. The rate of measles vaccinations has really suffered following COVID-19 and as you will know presents an even greater risk to young children.

Influenza – Ministry of Health

Measles vaccination – Ministry of Health

Aku mihi,

Iona

Network management

Since 1 February, unless excluded, anyone intending to establish a new licensed early childhood service needs to apply for, and be granted, network approval by the Minister of Education.

 

Approximately 30 applications are moving through our assessment process. Once the process is complete, they will go to the Minister for a decision.

 

We’re making small changes to the online application system to improve performance. For example, we’ve increased the amount of space available in the online form for ‘free text’ explanations and made the supporting information form an editable PDF.

Supporting information form [PDF, 99 KB]

Any individual providers with questions about their application should contact their local office or email ece.networkmanagment@education.govt.nz.

Work assessment underway on Teachers’ Pay Equity Claim

Together with NZEI Te Riu Roa, the Post Primary Teachers’ Association Te Wehengarua (PPTA), and the 524 named early childhood education employers, we are underway with the work assessment phase of the Teachers’ Pay Equity Claim.

 

This phase allows parties to the claim to understand if there is sex-based undervaluation in pay and conditions, by testing the work of affected employees against comparable male-dominated workforces.

 

This is the education sector’s largest and most complex pay equity claim, affecting approximately 90,000 kaiako | teachers across Aotearoa New Zealand. If undervaluation is found, unions and employers will negotiate a settlement to correct the pay of kaiako | teachers and tumuaki | principals in early childhood education (ECE) centres, kindergartens, kura, primary and secondary schools.

Next steps

Over the coming months, our pay equity team, along with our union partners, will continue to interview affected employees from a random representative sample of ECE centres, kura and schools from around the country. Our pay equity team is still scheduling interviews, so leaders/owners of selected ECE centres, kura and schools may soon receive a call to invite them to participate. While participation is voluntary, we encourage anyone asked to take part in an interview to make the time to be involved in this important mahi.

 

These interviews will help paint a picture of the work kaiako | teachers do, including their skills, responsibilities, experience, working conditions and degrees of effort. An Interview Brief will also be sent to confirmed interviewees to inform them of the process and purpose of this mahi and help them to prepare for the interviews.

 

A steering group of ECE employers named in the claim – the ECE Steering Group – will also provide sector advice to support employers throughout the process.

 

If you are an employer named in the claim, we would also appreciate if you could print and display this poster in areas visible to your staff, so they know what is happening. The poster is available in Te Reo and English.

 

Pay equity investigation for teachers [PDF, 782 KB]

More information

You can find more information on the work assessment phase, who the claim covers, and keep up to date with the claim’s progress on our website:

 

Teachers’ Pay Equity Claim – Ministry of Education

2022 ECE Census data now available

The 2022 Early Childhood Education (ECE) Census data and summary fact sheets are on Education Counts:

 

Annual Early Childhood Education Census – Education Counts

 

The ECE census is administered every year and provides a snapshot of high-level statistics for ECE in New Zealand. Data captured is for a one-week period in June and includes information about the services, enrolment/attendance numbers, teaching staff, and the use of languages.

 

 

More statistics can be found at:

 

Statistics – Education Counts

New professional learning opportunity

We are preparing to release a new professional learning opportunity to support the implementation of Te Whāriki. A suite of eLearning modules for early learning kaiako will soon be available on the education learning management system (where the child protection module is currently located) in a new Te Whāriki space.

 

Modules will support kaiako understanding of the NELP, Aotearoa New Zealand histories, gifted learners, Pacific learners, Mana and more. To access these modules, kaiako will require an education sector logon (ESL). Logging in means kaiako will have a record of the modules they can complete and can return to the place they left from.

 

Please check with your teams that they have these available. If not, they can download an ECE user request form:

 

Education on-line services access for early childhood using ESL [PDF, 392 KB]

 

Further information about an ESL is on the education applications and online systems website:

 

How to get an education sector logon – Ministry of Education

Homebased qualification requirements – training webinars

We will be running further webinars this year to cover the home-based service qualification requirements brought about by the Education (Early Childhood Services) Amendment Act (No 2) 2021. 

 

From 1 January, 30% of educators working in a standard-funded licensed service must hold a home-based service qualification. This is calculated based on educators who work at least four days in a calendar month. Details on what counts as a home-based service qualification can be found on our website, which also has more information on the changes.

 

Home-based staff qualification changes – Ministry of Education

 

From 1 January, quality-funded services must also have 70% qualified educators who hold a home-based service qualification. You will need to continue to keep records showing you meet the requirement for each month.

 

You can access the webinars with these links:

 

Homebased qualification requirement refresh webinar 1: 29 March 2023, 5–6pm – Microsoft Teams

Homebased qualification requirement refresh webinar 2: 30 March 2023, 9–10am – Microsoft Teams

 

We will not be recording these upcoming webinars, however you can still access the original webinar delivered in May 2022:

 

Home-based changes (webinar) – YouTube

 

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