Warrawee Care Centre recognised for Excellence
Date first awarded: 10 March 2014
Date re-awarded: 25 March 2020
Valid until: 24 March 2023
Warrawee Care Centre has been re-awarded the Excellent rating for the third time by the Australian Children’s Education and Care Quality Authority (ACECQA), the highest rating a service can achieve under the National Quality Framework.
The Sydney based school age care service was recognised for its inclusive partnerships with children and families, positive workplace culture and organisational values, sustained commitment to professional development and support of educators, and practice and environments that enhance children’s learning and growth.
Examples of exceptional practice at the service include:
- Year Four, Five and Six children observed man-made damage to their forest play site. In response, a family member assisted children to research ownership of the bush site and to contact their local Council and Member for Parliament (MP) to take action to repair the area. A council ranger conducted a site visit with the children to observe and discuss the cause of notable damage. The service has begun hosting its forest play program in other areas to support the regeneration of the forest site.
- Responsive professional development for educators and staff. The need to extend staff knowledge about behaviour guidance and to further develop skills for addressing children’s challenging behaviours was identified through staff appraisals and discussions at staff meetings. The director contacted numerous registered training organisations (RTO) to determine whether their courses would meet the specific training needs of the staff members and reflect an outside school hours care (OSHC) context. The director was successful in negotiating with an RTO for OSHC content to be added to the professional development, which sixteen staff members completed. The service acknowledges the professional development with improvements to children’s behaviour, increased rapport between children and educators, positive self-esteem of educators and educators building personal connections with the children.
- The introduction of a robotics program in 2019 which older children are responsible for. The children research, select, care for and teach others with the robotic resources. The service acknowledges that the robotics resources must meet the criteria of social play by supporting small groups to play together. To support this, children are asked to provide a written explanation for their proposed resource selection. The program is supporting:
- learning across age groups, with older children taking on teaching roles to support younger children’s play and building educator knowledge in robotics
- children experiencing uninterrupted and dedicated periods of time to explore resources which allows learning through trial and error
- children’s skills of resilience, persistence, and mastery of new technology.
As a leader in the education and care sector, Warrawee Care Centre utilises local network meetings, reference committee groups and its own training and professional development opportunities to foster knowledge sharing and skill development, and to improve sector practices with other education and care services, students and advisory groups. Through these leadership practices, the service ensures that their positive impact reaches beyond the children and families who are enrolled in their service.
About the Excellent rating
Services that receive a rating of ‘Exceeding National Quality Standard’ in all seven quality areas can apply to ACECQA for the Excellent rating. The Excellent rating is awarded for three years. After this time services have the option to re-apply.
More information is available on the ACECQA website