Chapter 10 Leaders in Practice Profiles

Angela Chng

Early Childhood Teacher and Team Leader, Mia Mia Child and Family Study Centre, Sydney (NSW)

I completed my diploma in EC in Singapore and came to Sydney to complete my undergraduate studies as an international student. In order to gain a better understanding of the cultural shift I had to make in becoming a teacher here, I worked as a casual staff at various centres while completing my studies. I came to realise each centre had its own culture and pedagogy and can differ greatly between contexts. I was employed as an EC teacher room leader with the three to fives upon graduation at the community-based centre. During that time, I was given space to explore the responsibilities of my role as a teacher and how I would shape the curriculum. As a new teacher, I was mentored in developing principles around working with families and staff and learnt how to articulate my thinking and pedagogy. I also began my professional journey as a supervising teacher to students who were undertaking their EC degrees and diplomas. These first few years as a full-time EC teacher laid the foundations of my future work with children, families, staff, students, volunteers and community.

I decided to take on part-time postgraduate studies after a few years, completing a Master of EC while working full-time. I saw upgrading my knowledge as an important aspect of being a teacher—an opportunity to consolidate some of my learning and to extend my pedagogical thinking and values. It was an opportunity to re-engage with theoretical understandings and because of my practical experiences and encounters I was able to make connections between theory and practice. After a semester of my postgraduate studies, I began working at Mia Mia Child and Family Study Centre at Macquarie University, Sydney as the EC teacher team leader of the three to fives room.

Mia Mia has a threefold vision; teaching, research and community. Carrying out my responsibilities and being accountable to this vision is part and parcel of my everyday work. I was challenged with my perspectives and beliefs not only about teaching but the EC sector in general. We believe in investing in qualifications of staff as a factor that contributes to quality education. Hence, every classroom has a degree-qualified (or higher) EC teacher as the team leader, leading each classroom. Our centre director, Wendy Shepherd, has a vision for Mia Mia to work towards a teaching team of teachers. Hence, staff are encouraged to upgrade themselves with the assurance there is a career pathway, where their employment will continue with their new qualifications. We are now seeing through our fourth staff member upgrading from a diploma to a teaching degree.

I was the first team leader who had to rethink how the room will work and look like with two degree-qualified teachers in the same classroom. With my knowledge and understanding of responsibilities of an EC teacher, I was able to create a framework that envisioned how team teaching and leadership would happen in our room. I took on the role of a mentor, supporting the neophyte teacher in her new role, setting goals with her and pacing the responsibilities she had to undertake as an EC teacher. During this time of team teaching, it was clear maintaining the role of the team leader held by the more experienced teacher is still an essential part of what makes it successful. I have always believed in the importance of investing in people: colleagues, volunteers and students. My vision and philosophy in establishing team teaching in my room is not about one teacher now having to ‘step down’ or where ‘responsibility is now less for each teacher’; rather, it means ‘our plate has become bigger’ as the neophyte teacher now has to ‘step up’ and the quality of our work with children and families should also grow. Our team teaching experience should signify double the joy, double the thinking, double the perspectives—bringing more depth to the curriculum and working towards a seamless flow in our accountability and challenges to the school’s vision.

Being just as observant as I am with children, to understand what the neophyte teacher’s strengths and areas to work on are, to learn about their pedagogical goals and then developing shared goals towards the room’s vision to support them in their achievements and progress helps them to know what is expected and what to work towards. Knowing when to do some hand-holding (coaching) and when to let go is important—mentoring should develop from a coaching relationship to a peer mentoring one. This includes evaluating a situation after it has occurred; at times playing the devil’s advocate; and knowing and understanding how the other person would like to be supported. Being generous with my time, knowledge and experiences, unpacking decision- making processes, and explaining why and how things are handled and evaluated will enable the neophyte teacher to understand better.

Growing in leadership must be supported with opportunities for professional development. Our annual staff retreats—attending conferences, workshops and presentations—have contributed in extending my pedagogical thinking and perspectives. Sharing my work at our annual Pedagogical Dialogues day (also known as Open Day) with the EC sector; during visits from local, national and international visitors to our school; through in- house and sector-specific publications and professional presentations; and opportunities to give lectures and tutorials to teacher education students have extended my skills and wealth of knowledge. A willingness to learn, to be thrown into the deep end, to take critical feedback with humility and grace, to stand up for my opinions and values, and to be open to differing opinions, feedback and perspectives are dispositions I continue to work on.

Published 2017

Debra Clarke

Chief Executive Officer, UTS Child Care Incorporated, Sydney (NSW)

UTSCC seeks to position itself as an employer of choice for high-quality early childhood staff. We are keen to attract and retain the best early childhood workforce that we can, and to this end we need to ensure that our staff are supported to do their job well. One of the ways that we do this is by providing great ratios and high numbers of qualified staff. UTSCC had already implemented many of the staffing improvements under the new national regulations well in advance of 2012, and continues to operate with staff ratios better than minimum standards in all age groups. All of our centres have operated for many years with more than 50 per cent of staff holding a Diploma or Teaching qualification and 95 per cent of all staff holding a Certificate 111 or above qualification. We employ an extra full time teacher above the NSW teacher requirements at each centre to help contribute to quality programs.

I measure the success of our human resources management strategies by looking at the following factors:

• Attraction: Are we recruiting the best staff? Do we get unsolicited requests for employment? Do we attract a strong field of candidates when we advertise? Do people know about UTSCC and await an employment opportunity? Do short-term contract or casual staff wish to become permanent employees?
• Retention: Do great staff remain with the organisation? Do staff upgrade their qualifications or seek a career path at UTSCC? Are staff supported to increase their skills through formal study or professional development opportunities?
• Engagement: Do staff know what is expected of them? Do they have the resources available to do their jobs? Does everyone know and understand what the organisation wants to achieve? Are people focused on being the best that they can be and providing the best care that they can?

Mutual responsibility for high-quality care, education and experiences for children exists between our organisation and staff. A workplace is not all serious, there should be a sense of fun and it’s a place where staff are challenged, they take pride in what has been achieved but do not rest on their laurels. We do have high expectations of our staff, because that will assist us to create wonderful centres for children, but in exchange we provide great pay and working conditions. For too long, it has been difficult for prior to school settings to offer the same wages and conditions that school settings can offer. UTSCC has negotiated a Workplace Agreement with staff that attempts to overcome some of this imbalance. I believe the critical conditions that assist us to recruit and retain good staff are:

• Wages: UTSCC pays teachers significantly above the award rates. For example, as at January 2012, our top step for a four-year trained teacher is 28 per cent more than the Educational Services (Teachers) Award per annum.
• Recreation leave: Full-time staff work 8.5 hours per day, and receive an RDO per month, plus 33 days annual leave per year (an extra 13 days).
• Programming time: Trained staff receive 1.5 hours per week for every 5 licensed places in their group. For example, a teacher responsible for programming for a 20-place room will receive 6 hours coverage from their face-to-face teaching duties to complete programming.
• Study leave: Staff who are completing diploma or teaching qualifications can apply for one week study leave per semester.
• Professional development: There is an expectation that all staff participate in professional development and we have a generous PD budget to ensure we maintain currency in thinking and challenge and support practices. We are also very choosy about what professional development opportunities we access. We want our staff to attend training, conferences and courses that are delivered by credible presenters, come from a strong knowledge or evidence base and are current in terms of ECEC trends.

Our Workplace Agreement was negotiated prior to the introduction of the Fair Work Act, so it is important to consult the current legislation around this. Fair Work Australia has a step-by-step guide on making an enterprise agreement on its website and it is important that organisations seek up-to-date advice. Other good sources of information are employer associations, workplace relations lawyers, unions and some peak bodies, for example, Community Connections Solutions Australia. Our agreement is a whole of service agreement, which means that it covers all staff employed at UTSCC including teachers, childcare workers, administrative staff and cooks.

Some of the steps that we undertook that were useful to our organisation were to:

• Be prepared in advance of negotiations. What clauses in our expiring agreement did we feel had been ambiguous, unclear or could be written better? Complete an environment scan; what are other organisations doing in their agreements that is novel, useful or that we want to replicate? What wages level do we believe will attract the right staff?
• Talk to staff, management and unions about what they would like to see in the agreement. This doesn’t guarantee that everything is achievable, but it does increase chances that your agreement will reflect your organisational goals and objectives to the level that they can be achieved through your industrial instrument.
• Ensure that you have fully costed proposals.
• Consider unique conditions necessary for your service. For example, being affiliated with a university means that in our service children’s attendance drops during non-semester time; it is useful to UTSCC to be able to appoint a small number of staff during semester only periods and important to these staff that they have permanency of employment—so we have a clause in our agreement around this.
• Make decisions about what workplace conditions you want to enshrine in your industrial instrument and what you will include in policy (the latter is easier to change).
• Communication at all stages throughout the process is vital.

Karen Palmer

Executive Director, Unicare EC Education, Perth (WA)

I have worked in the EC sector for over 30 years and it has taken me quite some time to learn how to create a community of learners within my workplace. I have discovered that I am not the ‘be all and end all’ of everything! That it takes a team of very different people with very different skill sets to create something magical. Creating a community of learners requires a dedication to creating relationships with people and understanding what they bring to the table. It requires not only an understanding of their talents, special abilities, likes and dislikes, but the ability to place trust and value in each individual. When educators can truly feel this, they really fly and feel that they can be creative in their thoughts and ideas. The challenge is to allow them to fly and not be tempted to ‘clip their wings’.

I currently work in a large service with 52 educators, and I know that if we are to achieve an effective workplace, then we all need to learn together, even if the area of learning is somewhat unfamiliar. An example of this occurred one afternoon at a pedagogical leaders meeting when we were brainstorming future goals, ideas and ‘where to next’ topics. Two educators began a passionate discussion about a TV documentary about the effects young children had on dementia patients and comments were made around how this could happen at our service. Other educators were enthused by the topic and so began the amazing journey with our ‘Treasuring Life’ program (bringing children and people living with dementia together). Educators were encouraged to research, document and put in place a plan which would work for our particular service.

Educators researched the topic of dementia and how contact with the elderly could have an amazing reciprocal outcome for them and our children. While educators had a great idea, we had to work and learn together and I found that my role was that of encourager, cheer leader and scaffolder of their existing knowledge as we all learnt together about the world of a person living with dementia. We currently attend a small centre for people with dementia every week with a group of six children. The results have been staggering and I wouldn’t have believed the change in the clients or the beautiful empathy and compassion demonstrated by our children if I had not listened, encouraged and supported the educators in this project. The end result has seen real transformation in some educators as they have witnessed their own idea, research and project work come to life.

So why create a community of learners? Because ‘The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones that do’. (Steve Jobs)

Ruth Weinstein

Owner, Director, Wee Care, Bondi (NSW)

We all try to create a sense of ownership of the program—it is not just me even though it is my business. We go away together a lot as a group and this helps form relationships. The first time we went away together I couldn’t get them to stop talking. The staff instigated monthly meetings between our two centres. They pick a topic to discuss, I research it, find readings and then we discuss what we have read/thought about. It allows everyone to have a voice and they all feel they can speak and be listened to. We look at each other from a strengths-based approach. We use our individual strengths and go to individuals we know who have a particular strength. Often in a meeting we start by saying what the strengths are of the person we are sitting next to.

For me it is very important that all staff have a voice. For example, with their documentation they look at it and plan together. Every staff member has focus children. They share their learning stories; for example, if one staff member did a learning story that included three children they would pass it onto the other staff who had these children as their focus. All our portfolios are online so it is easy to add a learning story. It also means that staff can discuss the same children and collaborate. As we are a single unit (five staff in one room) they are constantly sharing ideas and collaborating. Even untrained staff see things from different viewpoints.

There is no real hierarchy in the rooms and this has made a big difference to the staff working together. I do a lot of monitoring and this helps me to see who needs support. The more qualified staff mentor the less qualified staff. For instance, if a Certificate 3 is doing a portfolio entry they will be mentored and given lots of support—a bit like a critical friend. Staff members mentor the person who is under them and they want to do it and help each other.

When we hire a new staff person all staff have a say. I would say to the staff I think I have found someone and then we ask them to come for a couple of days to work at the centre to see if they fit in. I am very aware of the strengths of the staff and I listen to the staff. I do a lot of observing and if I see that something doesn’t look right I will quietly talk to them to see if anything is going on. There are not a lot of rules like this is your job, this is your morning tea break etc. Instead, staff negotiate and work it out between themselves. For example, they might say can you do the beds today and I’ll do them tomorrow. There are jobs to be done but they share them around. The staff support each other and it is a relaxed atmosphere. There are opportunities to relax together outside of work, for example, quiet dinner, bowling. The staff also get paid above award rates and I give presents. For example, after an accreditation visit I give all the staff a present to show my appreciation of their hard work and commitment. They also get a bonus each year. I feel they are very loyal and don’t see me just as their boss. I also like to give positive feedback on what I see them doing well. For example, I like the way you set that experience up this morning. This helps make a happy team and the staff also start to provide this positive feedback to each other as well.

I have had little direct experience with staff bullying in 35 years. I have only had two people who have done that. Partly it is because of the way I choose my staff, as all staff have a say. I also don’t let problems fester. I tell staff I can’t fix things I don’t know about. For example, if someone says so and so is not pulling their weight I would deal with it through watching and mentoring. I have been really lucky as I do hear stories about staff bullying and I think a hierarchy can lead to bullying. At my centre no one is allowed to lord it over someone else. I do run weekly mentoring sessions with every staff member. I did try to book in times but it doesn’t work for us that way. I make sure I have contact with each staff member every week, sometimes in the playground and sometimes I might chat to them when it is their office day each week (every staff member gets one office day for programming).

I think my saving grace has been that I grew up in this centre. I started the centre when I was 26 and I knew nothing management-wise as I had only been a teacher in a school previous to that. I didn’t know anything about business so what I did with my staff has been very instinctive. I don’t always get it right or do it the way the literature tells you but it works for me. For me this is not a company, we are a family.