2014 parent survey results - ecms · the survey and reply paid envelopes for families not...

2014 Parent survey results

192 High Street (PO Box 182) Northcote VIC 3070 T +61 3 8481 1100 E [email protected] W www.ecms.org.auManaged by ECMS - A leading not-for-profit provider

of early childhood education and care services.

2014 Parent survey results Highlights

In June and July 2014 over 1,500 ECMS families participated in our Parent Survey. They provided valuable feedback about their service and about ECMS as an organisation. The parent survey results demonstrate that ECMS is progressing its work to embed its values throughout the whole organisation.

Parents agreed that their service is:

Inclusive

• by responding to children with additional needs (96%).

• by providing additional support for their child’s individual health and learning needs (94%).

Respectful

• by taking on board what they tell them about their child’s needs (96%).

• by valuing their involvement in helping out (94%).

Connected

• by providing clear communication (95%).

Responsive

• 91% of parents agree that if they needed to make a complaint, they are confident that they would be treated with respect and that it would be followed up appropriately.

Trusted

• Throughout the parent survey, parents expressed strong appreciation for the educators who teach and look after their children. Parents agreed strongly with the statements, “my child’s educator interacts warmly with my child” and “my child’s educator responds with interest to what my child is saying.” When asked what the best things were about their service, 44% of parents explicitly listed their child’s educator.

• 94% of parents are satisfied that ECMS successfully manage their service, indicating a high level of trust in the way ECMS operates.

Introduction

Purpose

ECMS is committed to providing high quality early childhood education for children and to continually improving what we do as guided by the National Quality Framework (NQF). The Parent Survey gathers specific feedback from families regarding the service their child attends. This information can be used:

• by services to inform their Quality Improvement Plans (QIPs) and planning.

• to inform the planning and evaluation of ECMS initiatives and practices.

• to support the advocacy efforts of ECMS as we seek to be a voice for families in the early childhood sector and beyond.

Development

The 2014 Parent Survey is a new survey that replaces the survey conducted externally by RMIT over the last few years. The majority of questions in the 2014 Parent Survey have been developed using the National Quality Standards. Each standard was examined to see where parent feedback would be most useful and most relevant, and would inform the QIPs of individual services and the improvement of our services in general.

Method

All families of children in an ECMS service were contacted and invited to participate in the 2014 Parent Survey. In addition, all services, including each Family Day Care educator, received a number of paper versions of the survey and reply paid envelopes for families not completing the survey online. Families should have received at least one reminder during the three weeks that the survey was open.

Responses

The overall response rate of 28% is a 2% increase from the 2013 survey.

Obtaining current and accurate family contact details from a centralised source continues to be a barrier to increasing the response rate of the survey. However, it is felt that the responses received provide a diverse and representative parental perspective and adequately form the basis of this report. Services with the lowest response rates were contacted during the weeks the survey was open to encourage and promote participation. This enabled all services to achieve a response rate of at least 14%.

Response rates

Language mainly spoken at home

85% of ECMS families responding to the survey indicated that the main language they spoke at home was English. Hindi, Mandarin, Cantonese and Punjabi were the top four languages other than English spoken at home. Overall, 231 or 15% of parents who responded to the survey did not have English as their main language.

SERVICE TYPE TOTAL FAMILIES RESPONSES RESPONSE RATE

Kindergarten 3,887 1,149 30%

Child Care 1,242 340 27%

Family Day Care 462 70 15%

Total 5,591 1,559 28%



Results

Overall rating of service performance

Parents were overwhelmingly positive about the way their service is performing. A total of 98% of all families indicated that the service was performing at a good or very good standard. Family Day Care families were particularly positive with 100% of responses rating the service as good or very good.

Communication

Parents were asked to consider the clarity and the amount of communication from their service. Overall, the majority of parents are happy with communication:

• 95% of families indicated that communication was clear• 12% felt there was too much communication• almost a quarter of all families (23%) felt there was not enough

communication

Clarity of communication from the service

Amount of communication from services



Quality statements

Statements describing a high quality Early Childhood program were presented to parents. They were asked to consider their service and indicate if they strongly agreed, agreed, disagreed or strongly disagreed with these statements. The statements were based on relevant elements of the National Quality Framework and were selected because they related to areas that families would usually have opportunity to observe.

In addition, parents were given the opportunity to provide comments and suggestions throughout the survey, in order to provide a context for their ratings and to provide details of specific concerns or ideas. These comments were categorised and the most common themes have been summarised below in the pie graphs. A small selection of typical comments have also been included.

The results of the surveys are summarised below under the seven NQF Quality Areas.



Quality Area 1 - Educational program and practice

Comment summary

Sample comments – Educational Program and Practice

“Maybe a progress meeting with each parent to discuss child once in a while – there is no indication on how well child is progressing or opportunity to discuss any issues or concerns.”

“Parents could write an update at the start of the child’s week and the educators could write an update at the end of the child’s week.”

“I’m not too sure of the educational programs that they have in place in the 2 year old room. I would quite like to learn more about their techniques and schedules.”

“Better communication both in relation to broader events/activities the children are undertaking but also one on one. I have no idea when I collect my child at the end of the day how his day was, if he did anything of any particular significance, it’s just pick up your child and leave. I do normally ask ‘how was his day today’ however more often the response is ‘all good today’”.

“Not sure how much school readiness will be included in programme. Basic skills like reading and writing name, alphabet etc would be useful towards for the second half of the year.”





Quality Area 2 - Children’s health and safety

Content summary

Sample comments – children’s health and safety

“Minor improvements in the ‘healthy eating direction’ - eg wholemeal versus white bread. Better security at pick up for unfamiliar faces (as noted above - my partner was able to pick up our child on first occasion without showing id, and it’s possible to shadow someone in through security door).”





Quality Area 3 - Physical environment Content summary

Sample comments

“Safe, friendly environment for the children. Good facilities.”

“The outdoor play space is welcoming, challenging and spacious. It is also well shaded with plants and natural play elements and it allows for a wide variety of activities.”

“The outdoor play area is fun and stimulating. There’s always something new to do.”

“The education is oriented around play, and the activities are varied and reflect current/local events. There is a focus on sustainability and mental well-being.”

“Great recycling program introduced. Teaching children about sustainability and the environment –i.e. Water pump, garden beds.”

“The outdoor area is boring and uninspiring.”



Quality Area 4 - Staffing arrangements

Content summary

Sample comments

“Text message (from) service if kinder needs to be cancelled.”

“More stability in the teaching staff and clearer communication as to how a replacement to the current teacher will be introduced along with some advice on how to discuss this with the children.”

“Ensure consistency with the workers that come in and take care of our children ... since my child started I have met a lot of workers that have been assigned to the baby rooms; would like to know who is taking care of my child for the day – so if it’s agency would like to know.”

“Less staff rotations. Staff are moved from room to room multiple times throughout the day and I find that my child copes better with having her nominated carers in her room at critical times such as drop off and nap times.”



Quality Area 5 - Relationships with children

Sample comments

“The staff are friendly, approachable, supportive, loving, caring, kind, and awesome!”

“Carers take the time to know each child and they have great relationships.”

“I absolutely am thrilled with the educators in my son’s room. They are warm, friendly and take such an interest. He has warmed up to them so quickly and enjoys his time at care as a result of this.”

“(The FDC educator) provides a safe warm environment for my child to explore and challenge him. She takes great pride in her FDC. I think she is wonderful and my son just loves her too.”

Quality Area 6 - Collaborative partnerships with families and communities

Comment Summary

Sample comments

“The main gripe and point of contention was really with the beginning. We didn’t really have anyone take us through anything and as a result there was frustration and misunderstandings about what was happening. There needs to be a better induction process for parents.”

“It would be better if the educator can have a one on one communication sessions with each parent, at least once per quarter, so that the parents can get to know about the child’s needs and development. More interaction needed.”

“Provide newsletter probably at the end of term to allow parents know how the program went and how the children are enjoyed their time.”

Quality Area 7. Leadership and Service Management



Comment summary

Service provision

Family feedback on the services provided by ECMS is critical for ongoing planning in terms of our centralised services, for example our timetabling, budgeting, inclusion support, and service development. This information is also useful for our advocacy for families with regards to local and national issues such as Universal Access, Child Care reforms, workforce issues and financial support for families. Parents were asked to consider how well their needs were being met in a number of areas, and to indicate if they strongly agreed, agreed, disagreed or strongly disagreed. The figure below shows the percentage of parents who agreed or strongly agreed that their needs were being met.

The following points were noted from the data:

• A high proportion of families (95%) with children attending a 4 year old kindergarten program seem to think 15 hours is a suitable number of hours for 4 year old kinder.

• 24% of families with children in three year old kindergarten and 16% of those with children in 3+ Activity Groups felt that the number of hours available did not meet their needs (Table 15).

• 21% of Child Care families indicated that the affordability of fees was an issue. Almost a quarter (24%) of all 3 year old kinder families also did not agree that the affordability was meeting their needs.

• Some kindergarten families (21% overall, 17% of 4 year old) did not feel that their needs were being met in terms of being able to go to work. Further analysis of individual kindergarten timetables against parents needs being met to go to work will provide more insight into timetable preferences, i.e. longer days. It is worth noting however that this means that 83% of 4 year families ARE having their needs to go to work met by the service they attend.



ECMS management

The large majority (97%) of families were aware that ECMS managed their early childhood service. This level of awareness was slightly lower in families of children in child care services. There was also a high level of satisfaction with the way that ECMS manages services, with 91% indicating they were either satisfied or very satisfied.



Strengths

The areas for which parents across all types of service most frequently gave the highest ratings of quality fell into two categories:

1. Educator interactions with children

Parents indicated a very high level of agreement with the statement that their child’s educator(s) interacts warmly with their child, with this statement ranking in the top five most agreed with for all three service types. Parents with children in child care and kindergarten also showed a high level of agreement with the statement that their child’s educator responds with interest to what their child says.

2. Service environment

Parents with children in all three service types also indicated that they were happy that the service was a safe and secure environment for children. They also indicated that they were happy that the service buildings, furniture and equipment were safe, clean and maintained.

Parents were asked, “What are the best things about your service?” 1,214 parents responded to this question and the most frequent responses were in regards to:

• Educators … 65%• Program … 21%• Outdoor spaces… 5%

Areas for Improvement

Services

The areas for which parents across all types of service most frequently gave the lowest ratings of quality are outlined below:

1. Updates about their child

A significant number of parents disagreed that their service provides easy access to updates about what their child is doing and learning. 23% of parents of children in child care and 13% of parents of children in ECMS kindergarten felt that they did not have easy access to updates. This corresponds strongly with the high number of suggestions for more feedback about their child’s progress, feedback about activities and the need for greater daily communication from services. Common suggestions from families included scheduled parent teacher meetings in kindergartens, the use of online portals for communication, better use of daily communication boards in child care rooms and better handover to afternoon staff in child care services, so that they can provide accurate information to parents about their child’s day.

2. The educator replacement process

An area that was given a low level of agreement from parents across all types of services was the way services manage educator absence and the communication of their absence. The statement in the survey said that contingency plans were put in place in the best interest of the child and that the parent was informed of the situation. Given that the statement describes two aspects of educator absence (the contingency plan and the communication), it is difficult to know which aspect was most disagreed with. Policy and procedures in this area should be reviewed with these results in mind.





3. The service as a resource for support

Another statement that parents from all three types of service showed a lower level of agreement with was “the service is a useful place to find out about services or supports that the family might need.” It should be noted that parents in many communities are well resourced already and do not necessarily see their early childhood setting as the best referral source of additional support. However it could be useful for services if a template was developed that services can use to provide the relevant information or regional directories of relevant supports and access instructions for families (eg children’s hospitals, local council services).

4. Community connections

Parents in all types of services also showed a lower level of agreement that the service helped them feel more connected to their community. A number of our biggest providers of child care are based in the CBD and families using these services don’t live near the service and therefore don’t expect to be connected to the community around the service. The responses of these families lowered the overall average response. However, kindergartens and family day care results also places this statement in the lowest five, suggesting it is an area that could be reviewed and improved upon. Ongoing work to engage families and communities needs to take this feedback into account.

5. Orientation

Child care and kindergarten families also indicated that the orientation to the service they received when their child started could be improved. Whilst many families were very happy with this aspect of their service, 12% of child care families and 8% of kindergarten families felt that the orientation process was not useful and well organised. A robust orientation to a service is critical for educators in creating a strong and trusting relationship with families, by establishing clear expectations and clear avenues of direct communication between parents and staff. A comprehensive orientation can prevent misunderstandings.

6. Information about the service

Parents with children in ECMS Family Day Care services showed a lower level of agreement with statements regarding finding out information about the service. There were no additional comments or suggestions made by parents with regards to finding out more information about the service.

7. Responsiveness of educators to children with additional needs

Parents with children in ECMS Family Day Care services showed a lower level of agreement with the statement regarding the responsiveness of educators to children with additional needs.

8. Facilities upgrades

Kindergarten families frequently suggested that either indoor or outdoor facilities could be upgraded or improved, and often provided specific ideas of how this could be done.

Management

Many families (430) provided suggestions for how ECMS could improve their management of services. These suggestions were categorised and those made by more than one family are summarised below. Comments have been grouped into three key areas – operations, staffing and stakeholder engagement.

9. Operations

Families made comments about:

• kindergarten timetable preferences and requests for longer or more flexible hours for child care

• fees process, invoices to be spread more evenly over the year• enrolment process, including earlier notification of kindergarten

application outcome• resourcing services for new equipment and facilities upgrades• the affordability of fees• paying for public holidays



Sample comment

“Please do not send invoices out late, and expect people to pay >$700 in less than 1 week. I realise ECMS had an issue with getting invoices out, but to give people less than a weeks’ notice to come up with that amount of money was unacceptable. Whilst my family had no issues with paying $700 in such a short period of time, there are other families who would have struggled with this. I contacted ECMS by phone regarding this issue, however no-one returned my call. This made me feel that my concerns were of no regard to ECMS.”

10. Staffing

Suggestions were made with regards to:

• providing more support to educators• employing higher quality staff • staff needing to provide an educational program• the need for supervision of staff• staff wearing a uniform• retention of staff• staff training

Sample comment

“Providing more practical support to the Educators, in particular pro-forma template forms for family communications, into which Educators could just type relevant details.”

11. Stakeholder engagement

Many families expressed a strong desire to have more contact with ECMS, including:

• clearer and more frequent communication • easier access to ECMS head office staff, including a stronger

presence at events like AGMs• improved customer service, in particular a greater responsiveness

to emails and phone messages

• more detailed information about individual services on the ECMS website

• greater transparency from the organisation when there are issues within a service

• a clear complaints process/feedback mechanism• provision of support for families/children in need

Sample comment

“I have not met or spoken to anyone from ECMS. A face/front person for our centre would be nice to meet. When concerned about something and knowing who to contact and having met them would be an important service for me?”

“I think you are doing a great job. Perhaps at the first or second meeting of the new committee it would be good for the Educational Support officer be available to answer question of the new committee about processes eg Working bee, funding/planning, any parental complaints the process, role of the committee members in relation to ECMS.”

“They could answer their phones or actually call people back my child has been in kinder for three terms now and I still haven’t been called back pretty pathetic.”

“Communicate better with parents, listen to the local educators and be flexible in tailoring approaches at the centre, as there appear to be some recent initiatives brought in by ECMS head office that don’t suit the centre. Suggest that rather than a once a year survey, you hold semi-regular (say quarterly) group meetings with parents and educator representatives to discuss how the service is working for their children and seeking direct feedback tailoring services to particular age groups, levels and rooms (rather than a one size fits all policy that now seems to be applied from head office).”

“(Improve) communication and have an open complaints process that involves feedback and action.”

Summary

ECMS is grateful for the amount and quality of feedback provided by the parents utilising our services. In 2014 we heard from more parents than ever before and we are encouraged by the overall positive nature of the feedback received.

Acknowledging and acting on feedback provided in the parent survey is essential if ECMS is to continue to build a relationship with families characterised by trust and responsiveness. Whilst many strengths are identified by parent feedback, there are a number of issues that have been highlighted throughout this report that provide opportunity for improvement and reflection by all ECMS teams. Many of these issues also provide excellent opportunities for engaging further with parents and for informing the content of parent resources and communication.

• Feedback to families about their children and the educational program.

• Access to information about services online, e.g. work bee dates, special events, group/room news.

• Orientation on commencement at a service. • Educator absence/replacement process and communication to

families.• Punctuality of kindergarten session times. • Consistency in child care rosters. • Staff uniforms.• Links, resources and referrals for families to community services. • Promoting community connections.• Number of hours available in 3 year old kindergarten programs and

the cost of these programs. • The recruitment process for service based staff; consideration of the

immediate concerns and needs of families at the service.• ECMS complaints procedure.

• Visibility and accessibility of ECMS management.



2014 parent survey results - ecms · the survey and reply paid envelopes for families not...

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