Any Early Years Professionals on here?

[catsarecool]

Hi all,

Just wondering if there are any Early Years Professionals on here and if they could tell me a bit about what the training/job is like? I have a degree in a subject not related to childcare and am thinking about doing the 12-month full-time pathway.

We have an EYP in our setting that has done the full-time pathway as she has a degree in literature and no experience working with children. She is employed as a nursery assistant on minimum wage because she doesn't have any relevant experience.
I have a foundation degree and earn more than she does but I have over 20 years of experience working with children.

Theory is all well and good but settings are looking for expereince too.

I have never even heard of the 12 - month pathway, i did a CACHE diploma in childcare and education level 3, and i've been working in childcare for the last 8 years.

The training was 2 years, with 3 days in college and 2 days in placement with one week block placements in each one. I was placed with children in the family home (although i don't think they do that anymore), in nurseries and in schools, from children aged newborn to 7.

The training was appropriate, i am sure what i learned i use in my every day practice however you really do learn on the job.

If you were to pursue this, my advice in placement would be to use your initiative, always ask if you don't know and sometimes if you do, don't be cocky, and get on the children level always!!

Oh and the pay is really bad, but the good ones are never in it for the money

Early Years Professional courses have been massively scaled down this year - I think there are only 8 providers offering it now. I am suspicious that the Govt. is going to quietly drop it entirely soon

The thing to be aware of is that private nurseries generally do not have the budgets to pay graduate wages. If they can get someone with a level 3 NVQ at £14k to do the job, they are not going to stretch to a graduate practitioner. Especially if the requirement for private settings to employ an EYP is dropped.

If you are planning to do the 12 month pathway anyway, have you considered doing a PGCE in Early Primary? That would qualify you to work with 3-7 year olds, and you could find work in school nursery/reception classes, Children's Centre nurseries and pre-schools.

Hi cats,
I did the 12 month pathway, and thought I'd go on to work in a nursery afterwards. The course was excellent, but you will be up against a fair amount of resistance from people who have worked in nurseries for years (and fully I understand their feelings about this, it must be really annoying to have completely 'green' workers waltz in at a higher level).
When I applied for the EYP course it was sold to me as equivalent to QTS, and there were murmurs of a salary scale. However, it's clear that this isn't going to happen, so as soon as I'd finished it I started an Early Years PGCE. The EYP course gave me a brilliant headstart for the PGCE, and an extra selling point in the very competitive jobs market.

My nursery has 12 month EYP trainees, as my boss is an EYP assessor. If you get a good provider/assessor, it's a great way to get on in the field, but the wages are never going to compare well against other graduate jobs.
I did the short pathway with NDNA twice, failed the gateway both times. I found them unhelpful and poor at feedback, but that might just be me.

I'm aware the pay isn't good. Hopefully one day it will be comparable to that of teachers but pay isn't as important as job satisfaction for me. The Children's Workforce Development Council recently announced it will fund 7,200 places on EYPS programmes between 2012 and 2015, so I think the role is here to stay. (There are 8 lead organisations but 37 different providers). I have considered the Primary PGCE but I think I'd like working with babies and little ones.

Thank you all for your thoughts and advice, please keep it coming.

Also I fancy working for myself and running my own setting, whether that was a nursery, a pre-school or childminding.