Quality Educators…Is that a thing of the past?

Working in the early childhood education industry for over 15 years means many interactions with childcare centre directors. In recent months however, I can’t help but feel disappointed. Disappointed, because they are feeling let down. Directors are yearning for quality educators. Key word QUALITY. The most common discussion I have with CDs is obviously about educators. They are certified which is fantastic. They have the right checks and mandatory training done. So, paperwork — check. Now let’s put them in a room and ask them to provide high quality education and care to the children who have been entrusted to them by parents who feel disheartened by leaving their children all day to go to work.

This is the problem. They can’t. It is not that they don’t want to, it is they don’t know how to. I am not saying that all educators fall into this category. On the contrary, the majority are amazing educators who thrive to inspire, educate and care for children on a daily basis. They’re the ones that make a difference in every child’s life they come into contact with.

It’s the others. The ones that have just graduated in the last year or two. They have a different story.

When a director of a childcare centre interviews for a position at their centre, they need to ensure that the educator is aware of the National Quality Framework and the Early Years Learning Framework. They need to also ensure that the educator before them, understands what they need to do in case of an emergency or how to provide engaging and stimulating programs for the children in their care. They will even go as far as asking questions about nappy changing and hand washing procedures. All critical elements to being an educator. The one aspect they don’t tend to focus on when undertaking interviews is assessing an educator’s emotional intelligence. This is the differentiating factor between employing a high performing educator from a certified educator.

According to the Department of Employment labour market research, there is no shortage of educators in Australia as we get around 8,000 graduates. However, many registered training organisations are guilty of not training educators up to standard. In many cases, the graduates leave with a certificate III or diploma after paying up to $4500 but are still not ready for employment. Many courses are completed within 8 weeks and work placements might be supervised through phone. There is no real support or guidance by trainers and assessors. Many still are not fit to properly interact with children during their critical formative years. A tick and flick way of being trained and assessed is not the path to take and definitely not at the expense of our children. Inevitably many of these educators won’t get a position with childcare centres.

Where do they go? To recruitment agencies. They need numbers and educators need jobs. Are they assessed on whether they are suitable for the job? Possibly. How though? Mainly by ensuring all of their checks, qualifications and mandatory training is done. Paperwork — Check. This does not provide any indication of competency or quality.

At Shiftsimple, we have taken a different approach on how we select educators to be a part of our growing network. We measure an educator’s emotional intelligence (EI), the ability to understand and control one’s own emotions and recognise the emotions of others. This is turn allows the educator to act appropriately in relation to people’s emotions.

An educator who possesses emotional intelligence will excel at social interaction because they can predict and understand human behaviour and adapt to suit different situations, thus enhancing work relationships and performance. This is a crucial aspect of on demand staff, whose main challenge is being able to adapt to different environments on a daily basis. A casual educator needs to be ready to work in all age groups age, with different teams and adhere to each centre’s philosophy. An on demand educator could potentially work at 5 different centres in 5 different areas educating and caring for children from diverse cultural backgrounds. In other words, this educator needs to be ready mentally.

We interview our educators using EI questions to gain a deeper understanding of their ability to:

· be aware of their own and other people’s emotions including children, parents and their team

· recognise and control their behaviour

· manage their emotions to adapt to different environments.

Certain emotional qualities are essential for all educators. Emotionally intelligent educators have a natural empathy for other people’s feelings, which makes them thrive in a team environment. They build trusting relationships and effectively communicate with co-workers and children. They’re also aware of their own strengths and weaknesses, which means they’re open to receiving feedback when needed. As an educator, this is necessary due to nature of their ever-changing working schedule.

These are quality educators. These are the educators that childcare directors yearn for. These are the educators that will raise our future generations.