It has been an interesting week of discussions on PEI regarding early childhood development and learning.   A community meeting and discussion was held on Tuesday with members of the early learning sector.  A presentation was made by Joanne Schroeder of the Council on Early Childhood Development. Joanne is from British Columbia and has been involved in the ECD field through a variety of initiatives and organizations.  A separate presentation was also made to the provincial Standing Committee on Social Development by both Joanne Schroeder and Sonya Corrigan, executive director of the ECDA.  The Guardian ran an article by Teresa Wright and photo of this presentation yesterday. Here are a few highlights from the article:

Early childhood education on P.E.I. should be fully funded by government, say early learning advocates. In a presentation to the provincial Standing Committee on Social Development Tuesday, the Early Childhood Development Association (ECDA) and a provincial child and family services official from British Columbia said early learning for P.E.I. children is suffering due to a lack of resources in the sector.
"We need child care, we need parent supports and we need them to be universally accessible," said Joanne Schroeder, who works with the Children First Initiative at the British Columbia Ministry of Children and Family Development.
"I really don't want to sound too melodramatic but we're in an acute situation here."
She pointed to the labour shortages predicted across the country, especially those in P.E.I.
"To improve the population, a substantial investment in child development will be necessary," Schroeder said.
…when government decided last spring to move kindergarten into the public school system in 2010, the loss of provincial kindergarten funding previously provided to child care centres made the sector's financial difficulty even worse.
The change will amount to a $6- million loss to those centres, Corrigan said.
"We're already broke as a system, that could absolutely finish us off."
A comprehensive, fully funded early learning system needs to be established in the province, the presenters said.
"We don't really need to have new programs but we need to find a way to make them more coherent," Schroeder said.
Corrigan said government wage enhancement grants also need to be established for early childhood educators.
"It's necessary," she said.
"We can't afford not to."

I am pleased to see early childhood development and learning issues receiving continued attention on PEI.  Ongoing dialogue and discussion by both government and community is a good thing. Tapping into outside expertise is also a very positive sign of progress. 

After discussion about the community meeting with colleagues and attendees from the meeting, reviewing the Guardian coverage of the presentation to the Standing Committee on Social Development and further exploring my own recent experiences on PEI with ECD issues I feel compelled to raise the following questions and points for consideration:

·         Who is speaking for parents when it comes to the needs of children and families on PEI? How do we ensure they have a voice in the ongoing discussions that are transpiring?

·         What can PEI learn from comprehensive approaches to using the EDI such as the work that is being done in British Columbia?  What is PEI actually doing with it's own EDI results?

·         What can PEI learn from community based coalition examples from other Provinces?  Is it possible for all of the players come together and truly put children and families first?

·       How is a comprehensive, fully funded early learning system defined?  Further who gets  to define and design it? Do parents get to play a role in this or only those who work in the early childhood field/sector?  How do we ensure that parents are part of the dialogue?
 
·         What can PEI gain from the experiences of other areas in Canada when it comes to early learning? More importantly, how can those learnings be applied in PEI?  The fact is that the Island has a unique set of needs due to its size, culture and economics – simply applying what works in other places won't work on PEI – solutions will need to be customized in order to best meet the needs of PEI children and families.
 
·         What is this issue really about – children and families or those who provide the services to children and families?  Who gets to set the agenda?  How do we ensure families have a say in what they need?  Even more critical, how do we ensure that we put children first?  Are we building a system that best meets the needs of children and families? How do we actually do that with the existing system that is currently in place?
 
·         Is it possible that some advocates on PEI are calling for fully funded early childhood education on PEI due to their concerns about the government's plan to move Kindergarten into the public schools system in the near future?  Job security is at stake for many in the field, with government funding possibly drying up in the near future what will happen to the existing  operators who rely on that funding? 
 
·         How do we define quality early learning opportunities on PEI?  When will we start to truly discuss the fact that there are great variations in the quality of early learning environments on the Island?  What is the connection between quality early childhood experiences and learning outcomes in the school years? How are we measuring this? Does offering a "free program" translate to quality?
 
·         "We don't really need to have new programs but we need to find a way to make them more coherent," Sorry, but I have heard this time and time again on PEI.  What is the matter with offering new programs?  Why do so many who are involved with the existing early learning programs on the Island insist that there be no more new programs?  New programs ensure that families are given a range of options and choices when it comes to early learning experiences.  Doing "more of the same" is really not always the best solution.
 
·         What are we doing to support the vulnerable children and families on the Island?  Further, why are they vulnerable in the first place?  What more can be done to reduce the challenges that vulnerable children and families face?
 
·         How do we ensure that the needs of children with special health and learning conditions are part of this dialogue?  There are tremendous barriers for many families with children who are faced by such challenges.  How do we remove these barriers?  How to we ensure that the programs, services and supports are built to meet their needs and not the needs of the system?
 
·         Are we linking early childhood development issues, supports, services and choice/ quality to things like attracting professionals and their families to PEI in a shrinking labour market and to ensuring the future sustainability of the Island?
 
·         Should this discussion be about early learning programs alone or should it be broader than that?  Is anyone talking about the full spectrum of programs, supports and services that are needed by PEI families?  Let's make sure we are actually talking about a system that encompasses public education, parenting supports, prenatal education, outreach in rural areas, family friendly workplace practices, supports for stay at home families, expanded educational choices and much, much more.  We need these things – in addition to a range of quality child care program choices for infants, toddlers, preschoolers and school age children.
 
 
There is little doubt that this is a complex issue.  There are no simple solutions and it will take ongoing dialogue.  What I believe is truly needed is a broad based early childhood development strategy for Prince Edward Island that does more than sit on a shelf. One that addresses the full spectrum of early childhood development issues and that is about much more than just child care.  One that is comprehensive both in scope and nature. A strategy that is actually supported and implemented by all of the partners; inlcluding the PEI government.  We need to dream big…the sky should be the limit for our children.  After all, they are our future.  If we don't invest now we will pay later; there is endless research to demonstrate this.  Such a strategy will need to be designed through comprehensive public consultation, research and planning.  This will take the leadership and support of all who are involved – those who work with children and families, operators, professional associations, government employees, the government as a whole and the individual MLA's, community members AND most importantly – PEI FAMILIES.  Flexibility and a willingness by ALL to put PEI children and families first will be the key to success….for both the Island and it's children.

From Lack of day-care spots driving parents to extreme measures, September 19, 2008 – Business Edge Magazine

"Society has changed. Moms don't stay home – 75 per cent of moms with kids under six now work – so there's a huge shortfall and it's only getting worse."

The child-care crunch hit home for Kirby a couple years ago when, as a stay-at-home mom, she received four calls in one month from friends desperate for day care.

"I had friends and even acquaintances asking me to look after their kids because they had to go back to work and they couldn't find care," Kirby explains.

"The shortage of care is a huge problem not just for parents, but for employers because people either have to quit their jobs – which some of my friends have done – or put their kids in places where I don't feel they're being adequately cared for. The parents sadly keep their kids in those situations because they don't have an alternative and then they worry all day at work and are distracted, so how much does that cost the economy if parents can't concentrate?" Whether it's more productive employees or for an edge in the increasingly competitive arena of staff recruitment, some forward-thinking organizations are finding that providing day care makes good business sense. More than just a perk, onsite child care can be a huge advantage in a tight labour market.

"If people are struggling to find day care, they have to make some tough decisions and if you want to keep them in the workplace they have to have care for their children, so it's a definite advantage, both from a recruitment perspective and a retention perspective, to provide care as an employer," says University of Calgary associate vice-president of human resources Sandy Repic.