Early Childhood Education leaders from across metropolitan Melbourne joined Selmar Early Childhood Education Institute for a half-day panel and networking event on July 29th 2015 at our modern two-level campus in St Kilda.
Representing a variety of diverse communities, the child care industry panel comprised 23 directors, assistant directors and educational leaders
Kicking off with the launch announcement of our new blog, Casey, from Selmar’s Resource Development Team shared our goal for Selmar’s digital presence to become a hub for the ECE industry.
Pam Christou, manager of the Selmar JSA team, introduced Selmar’s new initiative to support job seekers undertaking Certificate III ECE classes in a centre environment. Selmar is currently taking expressions of interest from centres with physical space to conduct training.
Our first guest speaker, Cathie Cincotta, of the Child Protection team in the Department of Health and Human Services, provided an overview on the role of ECE for child protection in Victoria. Cathie also conducted training on how to complete the documentation used by centres to assess children’s and families’ needs around family violence. The lively session had centres sharing their approaches and challenges in responding to family violence.
Recent changes to traineeships under the Australian Apprenticeship Services Network (AASN) were explained by Claire-Marie Oostermeyer, a representative of Sarina Russo job seeker agency. Trainees can now access mentoring support through AASN – this is a great additional support to ensure meaningful traineeships for students and centres alike.
As part of our commitment to transparency and self-reflection, we sought feedback from our attendees on Selmar’s placement documentation and trainer manual – the tools we use to train our trainers and to train and assess learners. Valuable feedback was provided, which will prove helpful for reviewing our internal processes.
Concluding with an open discussion session, everyone enjoyed the great conversation about professional development (PD) in the ECE sector. We also talked about pursuing video tutorials for students. Some great ideas, which we’re looking into further.
We are very thankful to all who joined. The industry drives all aspects of Selmar, meaning events such as this are our very foundation. If you’d like to be involved in future industry events, stay informed by subscribing to our blog and look out for invites from your regional manager.
