The Role of Staff in Quality Improvement in Early Childhood

Sims, Margaret; Waniganayake, Manjula

doi:10.11114/jets.v3i5.942

Cited by 20 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…Extant research indicates that leaders (Educational Leaders/Directors/Deputy Directors -the differentiation remains unclear in many circumstances) in the early years of implementing the National Quality Framework spent as much as a third of their time on compliance focused activities such as monitoring pedagogical documentation created by the educators they were supervising, and working on the compulsory accreditation standards (Garrock & Morrissey, 2013;Rouse & Spradbury, 2015;Sims et al, 2018a;Sims & Waniganayake, 2015). This research found that whilst many leaders thought they were doing relationship work with their staff, their perceptions of the way in which they performed their work did not reflect this approach.…”

Section: Within Australiamentioning

confidence: 99%

Working as early childhood centre directors and deputies – perspectives from Australia, Finland and Norway

Halttunen¹,

Sims²,

Waniganayake³

et al. 2019

Leadership in Early Education in Times of Change

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This research is based in early childhood centres in Australia, Finland and Norway, considered the leadership work of centre Directors and Deputy Directors. Theoretically, this study is situated within the global landscape of neoliberalism that Sims (2017) describes as forcing the reshaping of early childhood policy in numerous OECD countries. Essentially qualitative in design, this exploratory study uses data gathered via a short background survey questionnaire, content analysis of job description statements, and a follow up interview with each participant. Findings indicate that there are differences within and across the three countries in the way these jobs are structured. It appears that the expectations of each role and how participants engage in leadership are framed by their centre contexts. In Australia, leaders of centres achieving an excellent quality rating tend to focus on relationship work when making leadership decisions. In Finland, Directors and Deputy Directors are expected to collaborate as partners when overseeing the work of 2-3 centres and other services. In Norway, there has been a redistribution of work where Deputy Directors have a co-responsibility in leadership enactment. When taken together, these findings illuminate new insights on how Directors experience leadership when Deputies are part of the leadership team in early childhood settings.

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Section: Within Australiamentioning

confidence: 99%

Working as early childhood centre directors and deputies – perspectives from Australia, Finland and Norway

Halttunen¹,

Sims²,

Waniganayake³

et al. 2019

Leadership in Early Education in Times of Change

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…ECEC leadership development has been linked to quality (Rodd, 2013), where effective leadership is expected as ‘the leader inspires changes in the quality of service delivery’ (Sims and Waniganayake, 2015: 190). Scholars have argued that good leadership should be inclusive and collaborative (Davis, 2012), distributed and collegial (Siraj-Blatchford and Manni, 2007), and more effective when transformational styles are employed (Lindon et al, 2016).…”

Section: Leadership Development and Childcare Markets In English Ececmentioning

confidence: 99%

The micropolitics of posthuman early years leadership assemblages: Exploring more-than-human relationality

Fairchild

2018

Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood

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Engaging with posthuman theorising, this article puts to work a number of concepts to produce generative reimaginings of early years leadership. In 1992, Deleuze argued that we are witnessing a transition from societies of confinement to ‘societies of control’. In societies of control, power operates through neo-liberal corporate worlds via a process of ‘continuous modulation’, which encourages a regime of perpetual flows of change, revealing new productions of a more posthuman agency. Drawing on the work of Deleuze and Guattari, the author notes how the concept of assemblage can be employed to explore leadership. She argues that early years leadership in England is part of a wider set of connections and relations which include human and non-human ‘bodies’. The assemblage connects and collects bodies, and is not defined by its individual components but by what is produced as these bodies interact. These interactions can be striated, which explores certain forms of leadership. However, smoother spaces can also be produced, which empirically reveals the situational ethics and micropolitics of four early years leaders who are entangled with children, policy, neo-liberal framing, quality, curriculum, and social and material worlds in their settings and schools. This article broadens current views on early years leadership by taking a more-than-human view of relations between human and non-human bodies as a distributed subjectivity which reworks notions of solely human agency. This production allows the author to question how posthuman leadership and the ethics and micropolitics of connectivity might function in this new form of more-than-human relationality.

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“…In this line, several authors [26,27] state that it is essential to know the opinion of the professionals since it directly affects the design, dedication, and results of the service provided. Therefore, it is important to consider the perception of the professionals who compose the multidisciplinary teams in EI centres [1,28] for the design of specific measuring tools [29]. However, the perspective of professionals has been studied only as another dimension of service quality [28].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Therefore, it is important to consider the perception of the professionals who compose the multidisciplinary teams in EI centres [1,28] for the design of specific measuring tools [29]. However, the perspective of professionals has been studied only as another dimension of service quality [28].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Inventory of Quality in Early Intervention Centres for Service Providers: Preliminary Validating Study in a Spanish Sample

Jemes-Campaña

Romero-Galisteo

Labajos-Manzanares

et al. 2020

IJERPH

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Evaluating the service quality in early intervention (EI) from the perspective of professionals with knowledge in this area is essential for the improvement of EI centres. In this study, we aimed to test the reliability and validity of the adapted Inventory of Quality in Early Intervention Centres-P (IQEIC-P) in a sample of professionals who worked in EI centres. Three hundred and twenty-four professionals of 85 EI Spanish centres were recruited for this research. Various psychometric analyses were used to evaluate the factorial structure, the internal consistency, factorial validity and construct validity. A 5-dimension structure was obtained in the exploratory factor analysis (EFA). The results showed an adequate internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha values between 0.71 and 0.83, and composite reliability (CR) values higher than 0.70), as well as satisfactory convergent and discriminant validity (average variance extracted (AVE) values above 0.50). In the confirmatory factor analysis, good model fit indicators were observed. The IQEIC-P showed adequate psychometric properties, demonstrating to be a valid instrument for the evaluation of service quality in EI centres from the perspective of professionals. The benefits will influence the professionals themselves, and they will have a positive and direct impact on the families that are attended to in these centres.

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The Role of Staff in Quality Improvement in Early Childhood

Cited by 20 publications

References 22 publications

Working as early childhood centre directors and deputies – perspectives from Australia, Finland and Norway

Working as early childhood centre directors and deputies – perspectives from Australia, Finland and Norway

The micropolitics of posthuman early years leadership assemblages: Exploring more-than-human relationality

The Inventory of Quality in Early Intervention Centres for Service Providers: Preliminary Validating Study in a Spanish Sample

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