Pre-school Education

(asked on 6th January 2017) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if her Department will conduct a formal review of the effectiveness of having qualified early years teachers in early years settings on children's attainment at early years foundation stage.


Answered by
Caroline Dinenage Portrait
Caroline Dinenage
This question was answered on 16th January 2017

The Government is developing an early years workforce strategy that will set out what we will do to support employers to attract, retain and develop high quality staff. As part of the strategy, we are considering how we can support growth of the specialist graduate workforce as evidence suggests they have a positive impact on the quality of early years provision.

Ofsted evidence from 2015 clearly shows that settings that employ more highly qualified staff are more likely to obtain a good or outstanding rating from Ofsted. In 2014, research led by Ms Sandra Mathers for the Nuffield Foundation looked at provision for disadvantaged three and four year olds and showed that where settings employ specially trained graduates, quality is higher and that the quality gap between settings in disadvantaged and more affluent areas is narrower.

To set the direction and identify priorities for our early years workforce strategy, we are considering a range of evidence, including that from stakeholders and colleagues. We are factoring this evidence in to our thinking on this strategy

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