Early childhood educators’ well-being, work environments and ‘quality’: Possibilities for changing policy and practice

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Abstract

A child’s right to high quality education not only relies on a competent and skilled workforce, but one in which educators are well. Supporting a well workforce requires governments, organisations and educators to attend to work environment quality. This attention needs be based on sound, relevant evidence. In this paper we contribute evidence of educators’ well-being from the survey component of an Australian study with 73 participants. We map results against international guidelines, and policy openings in Australia’s National Quality Standard to understand how educators’ work environments are affecting their well-being. We conclude that existing policies on quality in early childhood education in Australia attend to only some features of work environments, with a notable absence of attention to supporting educators in the relational complexities of their work. To enable educators to provide high quality education and care, greater attention is needed by organisations and governments to what quality work environments might look like.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)50-65
Number of pages16
JournalAustralasian Journal of Early Childhood
Volume46
Issue number1
Early online date21 Dec 2020
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 01 Mar 2021

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