WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE POSSIBILITY OF LOSING 3-YEAR-OLD KINDER? POST A COMMENT BELOWKINDERGARTEN for three-year-olds could disappear within years if nothing is done to improve infrastructure or increase teacher numbers in the City of Maribyrnong, according to forecasts by the council.
The report Our City - Our Children: Hearing Their Voices predicts the city's baby population will grow by 8per cent over four years from 5028 to 5467.
This, combined with the Federal Government's aim to provide 15 hours of kindergarten to all four-year-olds, means centres may stop enrolling three-year-olds.
Some, like Yarraville Community Kindergaten, have already been forced to do so. Director Tanya Piccolotto said: "This year we had to get rid of three-year-old kindergarten to make room for another four-year-old class and the committee found that very hard to do."
Maribyrnong's family services and community projects manager Lynley Dumble said this would only become more common.
"To be able to provide 15 hours' care for every four-year-old child, most of them [the centres] will have to think about whether they continue three-year-old kindergarten at their sites."
Ms Dumble said the situation had prompted the State Government to request all councils to assess the capacity of kindergartens and to look for alternative spaces that could be used - such as primary schools.
"Some child-care centres already run a kindergarten program and in the next couple of years they'll all have to employ a qualified educator. So that could mean more options for parents.
"Schools might have a kindergarten program as well. That's nothing we've discussed with them yet, but we're looking into it. We're not saying three-year-old kindergarten will stop, but we do need to assist kindergartens to provide it [in the future]. It just might be delivered in a slightly different way."
Scots Kindergarten director Beverly Harry said the West Footscray centre already had a long waiting list for three-year-old classes, and if 15 hours for four-year-old children was introduced, "three-year-olds groups are gone".
She said such a system would lower the quality of kindergarten classes in preference of quantity and reduce the choice for parents.
"I think 15 hours [per child] stinks. To me, that's not kindergarten; that's child care. It means you have to involve lunch routines and sleep routines, so it's going to be care with a bit of education tacked on." Ms Harry said the longest session, of four hours, was already "pushing it".
"Parents aren't being offered a choice. Some people want five-hour sessions, others are only after two- or three-hour sessions. The one-size-fits-all system, when you're talking about individual children, doesn't work."
Maribyrnong's community wellbeing general manager, Jenny McMahon, said council staff were also considering whether to introduce "zoning" to its central kindergarten database, which would restrict parents to sending their children to the closest centres.
The council statistics also showed the municipality's 'baby boom' suburbs have changed, with Maidstone set to house 30per cent more babies by 2014 - the largest increase. Footscray will be next with a predicted 22per cent increase, and Maribyrnong 18per cent.
WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE POSSIBILITY OF LOSING 3-YEAR-OLD KINDER? POST A COMMENT BELOW
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