Part #1
I have to admit that this has not been as easy as I had planned to locate professionals outside the US. I was very eager to find professionals from Australia and England and started with the sites in our blog resources. I selected OMEP sites for the 2 countries and emailed both agencies, but to no avail. I did not received responses and decided I did not want to wait much longer. I ended up on Facebook and found the PACCA page (Pennsylvania Child Care Association). PACCA shares articles on a variety of ECE topics and they happen to be covering the Big Steps initiative in Australia. From what I have gathered so far, they are working to bring attention to the professional attributes of child care and calling for increased wages. I reviewed their page and found a link to the Australian Early Childhood Education Network and private messaged them. They are eager to work with me and answer whatever questions I have. As I felt successful with Facebook, I searched for England Child Care and game across a child care named the Grafton House Day Care Nursery. They offer free child care for children ages 2 and 3. I reached out to them as well and they have responded positively. I am looking forward to learning more about each country and what their successes and challenges are.
Part #2
I chose to research http://www.early-education.org.uk/ because I have researched the High Scope program and many of the training materials are based in English Child Cares. I am eager to learn more about their systems.
Questions...
I am interested in learning about their ratios, pay/benefits, training requirements and general working conditions. I am also interested in learning about the perception that parents and government have on child care in these countries and their funding sources as well as QRIS.
I enjoyed reading your post and I send emails to many countries and I didn't get many responds back and some the email was wrong and the message was sent back to me. I understand you I went thru the same thing. I remembered I had visit some preschools in Mexico so I emailed the director from the schools I had visit and she gave me the information to call. Almost all the preschools were very expensive but very nice. They had their own gym where they tumble and exercise. I thought it was amazing. I'm going to try to get more information from low income preschools. I would like to visit them and learn from them. It will be interesting learning about Australia hope you can gather more information. Good luck great post!!
ReplyDeleteHi Arlene
ReplyDeleteI am glad you received some responses to your email and can not wait to see what some of their responses may be.
I have not made any connections with people from other countries yet but I hope to get some responses soon. I will however enjoy reading about the connections you make during this course. I will have to do some research on the high scope program to learn more about it. Thanks.
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