Early Childhood Development (ECD) is the right of every South African child. The kind of education young children receive plays a pivotal role in their overall development and their future economic standing.
According to the United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF), the early years of childhood form the basis of intelligence, personality, social behaviour, and capacity to learn and nurture oneself as an adult. In South Africa, over 3 million young children are not receiving such education due to legislative issues. Currently, millions of these kids are not attending an ECD center or even attending an unregistered one. If not that, they are not receiving a subsidy to fund access to an ECD centre.
A new campaign has come to the fore, collaborating with ECD owners and NGOs to drive real change. It is coined the Real ECD Reform.
If we ever want to change the future of our country, ensuring that children receive a quality education in their childhood and access to it whether or not they can afford it is of paramount importance.
The campaign is calling for the easy registration of ECD centres, including playgroups and the like. It also wants support of the sector’s infrastructure and programme standards.
According to the current supporters of the campaign “we want to show Parliament, the Department of Social Development and the Department of Basic Education that the voices of parents, practitioners and ECD providers matters. That our experience of the rules and systems in place, matters. We will actively participate in the Parliamentary process pushing for the reforms we know the sector needs.”
To show your support, click here to make a submission to the government before 27 November 2020.
