By Judy Flores-Partlow
The Early Childhood Care and Development Council (ECCDC) is highly considering the province of Negros Oriental as its pilot area for a program that will professionalize day care workers in the country.
At a press conference Wednesday evening, ECCD Council officials disclosed the move is in response to the need of focusing on making day care centers not just a child-minding facility but also as a learning institution for children aged 0 to 6.
President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo had created the ECCDC through Republic Act 8980 and had allocated about P100 million as start up fund for the council which is attached to the Office of the President.
The ECCDC functions as the principal agency that would implement government’s early childhood care and development programs on health, nutrition and early education.
Studies have shown that the brain development of a child starts from that age level, said Andrea Trinidad Echavez, Communications and Advocacy Consultant of the ECCDC.
Home-based and public day care center workers must have the proper skills, modules and training to be able to run these facilities, she said.
According to ECCDC field operations manager Rolando Cucio, a law that was passed some 45 years ago and which was devolved to the barangays to run day care centers need to be re-evaluated.
This particular group of workers, with about 48,000 total in the Philippines, has to be professionalized through capacity-building, training, and making day care employment a career.
Accreditation of day care workers is also being pushed under such proposal, Cucio added.
The ECCDC, composed of government agencies such as the Department of Social Welfare and Development, Department of Education, Department of Health, the Nutrition Council, and the Union of Local Authorities of the Philippines (ULAP), is currently undertaking a universal profiling of day care workers in the country, said Cucio.
Most of the regions in the Philippines, except for Regions 1, 2, 3 and 7, have already completed the universal profiling, he added.
To be able to achieve its goals of professionalizing the day care workers, the ECCDC has tapped non-government organizations such as the Australian Business Volunteers and the Oriental Negros Child Advocacy Network (ONCAN) to assist them.
ABV in-country manager for the Philippines, Waya Araos, who joined the ECCDC team during Wednesday’s visit to Dumaguete, said that they provide technical assistance to partners from local governments, NGOs, and even the private sector.
Araos said about 400 volunteers have been assigned in the Philippines over the last ten years, working with their partner NGOs on strategic planning, human resources, geographical information systems, business planning and product development.
ABV does not provide grants or financial assistance; however, volunteers’ expenses are being paid for by the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID), she added.
Araos said ABV will assist ONCAN on strategic planning and other areas as required. (PNA)
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