Hard work by the staff at Kubby House Child Care Centre has paid off with the centre recently getting a big tick in their National Quality Standard accreditation assessment process.
The centre has been providing quality education and care to children for a number of years and is Cobar’s only long day care centre catering for children aged 0-6 years.
Childcare centres are required to undergo an assessment and rating process every three years to ensure they meet the National Quality Standard and the requirements of the National Regulations.
The assessment process is carried out by a member of the regulatory authority and looks at 58 different elements of the service.
It was conducted over a two day visit to the centre in which the assessor met with staff and also spent time in each room observing the interactions of the educators and children.
During the process they look at the centre’s education program and how it is put into practice; they assess the children’s health and safety at the centre; look at the physical environment and staffing arrangements; observe the relationships between staff and children; and look at the collaborative partnerships of the centre with families and the community and also assess the leadership at the centre.
Kubby House supervisor Ashley Place said when the centre was last assessed in 2013, it was rated as “working towards the National Quality Standards” with only six out of the 58 elements not met.
In its assessment this year the centre has met all of the 58 elements.
“The National Quality Standards are something we are working towards in every aspect of our day, so I guess it is a fair comment to say that it takes a lot of hours to ensure we meet the standards,” Ms Place said.
“It is something that all of the staff can be very proud of as it is something that needs to be done as a team,” she said.
“No individual can achieve all that is needed to achieve this rating, we all have worked together to improve our service practice.”
“It is something that we are continuously improving on and we hope that we can eventually achieve the exceeding rating in our service.
“We use a quality improvement plan to help us achieve our meeting rating so we can constantly reflect on our practice and work towards improving all that we do on a day to day basis.”
Ms Place said in particular the centre hopes to improve their education program and so a number of staff are currently studying a Certificate III, Diploma or Advanced Diploma in Child Care in order to achieve an “above standards level”.
