The Federal Minister for Minister for Education and the Minister for Early Childhood Education/Minister for Youth today issued a joint media release to support release of this report undertaken by ACECQA. The Report identifies some emerging concerns:
Increase in the number of reported incidents and allegations occurring in services with additional support required to improve educators’ ability to identify, respond to and understand differences between developmentally expected sexual behaviour and concerning or harmful sexual behaviour by children or between children.
Increase in reported use of inappropriate discipline or interactions by educators, often in relation to children with additional needs and in situations where multiple educators may be present.
The absence of a consistent and coherent national framework to manage risks of ‘persons of interest' including knowledge about how and when to share information about these persons both within and across jurisdictions.
Educators and staff working with children having difficulty in understanding and navigating different thresholds of obligations and reporting requirements across jurisdictional schemes, such as WWCC and mandatory reporting.
Approved Providers and staff working with children do not always understand their respective responsibilities to create and maintain a child safe culture and environment. This includes their understanding of the requirements to identify, respond to, and appropriately report suspicion of child maltreatment.
Some Approved Providers do not understand the importance of undertaking thorough and comprehensive due diligence when hiring or engaging staff.
Continued in the next post (Part 2).....
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