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Eurydice

EACEA National Policies Platform:Eurydice
National reforms in early childhood education and care

Austria

14.Ongoing reforms and policy developments

14.1National reforms in early childhood education and care

Last update: 9 June 2022
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2022

Extension of Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) (Ausbau der Kinderbetreuungseinrichtungen)

Regulation and legislative documents 

Status: Agreement concerning 2018/19-2021/22; the current agreement expires at the end of August 2022, the start of negotiations for a new agreement began in October 2021

Sources: 

Description:

The main focus of these expansion efforts is on child care offerings for children under 3 years of age, promoting qualified child-minder offerings, and extending opening times during the year. Childcare places for 3 to 6-year-olds will also be funded in order to close regional gaps in childcare.

Measures:

  • 5 years old now have to attend 20 hours instead of 16-20 hours of ECEC at least four days per week.
  • Language promotion:  the new agreement introduces a uniform instrument from the kindergarten year 2019/20, which will be used equally in all provinces. This will be compact and provide accurate information on the concrete language support requirements.
  • Greater attention is also paid to the quality of the support and the competence of the facilitators.
  • A separate value and orientation guideline will be used as a binding component in the educational and care work. In this guide, the constitutional values and principles such as equal rights, tolerance, participation and many other essential values are pedagogically prepared. The guideline is intended to support elementary educational institutions in conveying these values and serves as guidance and orientation for educators.

Objectives:

  • Increasing the equality of opportunities and improving early language development are educational objectives, in order to better prepare all children for the demands of school;
  • Help people achieve a balance between work and family life;
  • Contribution to enhancing (full-time) employment opportunities for women.

Expected impact:

Promote the availability of childcare facilities of good quality.

Amount of funding:

Between 2018 and 2021, € 142,5 mn per year will be made available by the federation, and the regional governments will co-fund these efforts with 38 mn per year.

Monitoring:

The respective regional governments are responsible for monitoring compliance with the statutory obligations and supervising the staff and materials used in public kindergartens (nursing schools), which includes, among other things, a kindergarten inspectorate.

Involved bodies: