The Association of Early Childhood Educators Ontario (AECEO) has been leading the charge to improve wages and working conditions for Registered Early Childhood Educators (RECEs) and staff in Ontario.The AECEO’s Decent Work Task Force delivers our workforce strategy recommendations to the provincial government today - November 30^th 

We are calling for a commitment from the Ontario government to bring all RECEs up to $25/hr to reflect their level of education and the value of their work.

Read the full report here.

Campaigning and leadership success!! The Ministry of Education will fund child care programs to meet the financial demands of the increased minimum wage. RECEs and staff will receive the $2/hour wage enhancement on top of the new $14 min wage in 2018. This is a huge win for the licensed child care sector and one step closer to professional pay for all RECEs and early years staff in Ontario. It is also a promising signal the Province agrees that government funding rather than fee increases is the solution for professional pay and decent work in the early childhood sector!

Ministry of Education memo on wage support

Toronto Star coverage

Campaigning and leadership success!! The Ministry of Education will fund child care programs to meet the financial demands of the increased minimum wage. RECEs and staff will receive the $2/hour wage enhancement on top of the new $14 min wage in 2018. This is a huge win for the licensed child care sector and one step closer to professional pay for all RECEs and early years staff in Ontario. It is also a promising signal the Province agrees that government funding rather than fee increases is the solution for professional pay and decent work in the early childhood sector!

Ministry of Education memo on wage support

Toronto Star coverage

Nicole is an RECE from Toronto who shares her story about her unique experience of getting her children into quality child care. She observed the struggles RECEs were dealing with and decided to leave her job and join the sector to learn more, and do her part in supporting the children, families and communities involved. 

Kathleen Matharoo is a Registered Early Childhood Educator from Kitchener who works at an Ontario Early Years Child and Family Centre. She is passionate about family support programs and her role in supporting children, families and communities but also feels undervalued because RECEs in family supports are not eligible for the $2 Wage Enhancement Grant. 

Shona Mills is a Registered Early Childhood Educator from Burlington.  Her story outlines the impact of being unable to afford child care as a single parent and how the $2 wage grant roll out’s effect on the RECEs she knew motivated her to create an advocacy group to use her voice to create change. 

Tracy Dore is an RECE from Ginoogaming First Nation. Tracy shares her concerns about the children of her small community, and desires of providing them with the quality care and education they need and deserve. 

Shana Kealey is a single parent living in Scarborough.  Her story details her struggles of not being able to find accessible, affordable child care.  Shana took to Social media to create awareness for the lack of child care in her community that resulted in Toronto Children's Services reaching out to find her a space after 4000 views of her video. She has continued to advocate for affordable child care across Toronto. Shana joined our Building Skills for Change workshop in Toronto and shared with ECEs in the importance of sharing your story to advocate for change.

The child care story project is an important part of the AECEO’s Professional Pay & Decent Work Campaign. Our goal is to collect and share stories from across the province to highlight the need for quality affordable early years and child care programs where registered early childhood educators and staff are well supported with professional pay and decent work

Our first video is from Carolyn Ferns.  Carolyn first started her career as an ECE working in an infant/toddler room when she realized that there was an overwhelming amount of families unable to afford licensed child care and that the ECE profession was extremely underpaid.  Carolyn then decided to return to school to further her career in ECE research so that she could make a change.  

Everyone has a child care story to share: we are asking RECEs, early years staff, parents, children and community members to share their child care stories in support of the AECEO’s Professional Pay & Decent Work campaign. 

You can send your completed story to [email protected] and/or share on social media and be sure to tag the AECEO and your MPP along with Minister Indira Naidoo-Harris @MPPIndiraNH and Premier Kathleen Wynne @Kathleen_Wynne 

More tips on how to Share your Story

Professional Pay and Decent Work Campaign Support Pledge

Please join our campaign by Pledging Your Support Online Now!

Introducing Our New and Improved eceLINK!

The AECEO Board, Editorial Committee and staff are very excited to present the first issue of a revamped and improved eceLINK. This issue offers the debut of the Peer Reviewed Collection, on the topic of Collaborative Practice and Pedagogies. Along with the exciting debut of the Peer Reviewed Collection is a fresh new design that brings the look of the magazine right up to date. A selection of interesting articles on a variety of topics in early childhood will keep you reading every page!

Making space for the peer reviewed articles means some adjustment to our regular content.  You will find the new member list and donor thanks, as well as the full list of AECEO Certified members, in the Winter 2017-2018 issue. We hope to publish the Peer Reviewed Collection in every other issue and the new members and donor thanks will now also be published in every other issue. The Editorial Committee plans to continue developing new, regular eceLINK features that will add interest and value to the publication for AECEO members.

Much appreciation and thanks go to the eceLINK editorial committee for their hard work and expertise:

Rachel Langford, Ph.D. Editor of the Peer Reviewed Collection
Brooke Richardson, Ph.D. Publication Co-Chair
Laura Coulman RECE, Ph.D Candidate, Publication Co-Chair
Veronica Pacini-Ketchabaw, Ph.D.
Goranka Vukelich RECE, Ph.D.
Shani Halfon RECE, MA ECS

We hope you enjoy reading this issue as much as we did putting it together.

AECEO Provincial Board of Directors

In This Issue:

• Creating Inclusive Early Learning Environments for LGBTQ2+ Families (Featured article available to the public)
• Bringing Nature to Niagara’s Youngest Children: Early Childhood Community Development Centre’s Naturalized Playgrounds Project
• Professional Pay and Decent Work Project Update: Mobilizing community voices for professional pay and decent work in the early childhood sector

Peer Reviewed Collection

• (Re)Imagining and (Re)Engaging in Relational Encounters: Communities of Practice for (Re)Vitalizing Pedagogies
• “Good-bye Mr. Raccoon, we’ll miss you!” Supporting children’s explorations of life and death in a forest

    (member access)

Not a member? Membership supports a strong, united voice for ECEs in our province.  
Join today and get instant access to our eceLINK publications, online professional learning and so much more!

We would like to thank the following advertisers for helping to support this issue of the eceLINK

School Specialty

CALL FOR ARTICLES

Issue: Spring/Summer 2018

Special issue: Indigenous Practices and Knowledge in Early Childhood Education

Submission deadline: January 4, 2018

Find out more here

Introducing Our New and Improved eceLINK!

The AECEO Board, Editorial Committee and staff are very excited to present the first issue of a revamped and improved eceLINK. This issue offers the debut of the Peer Reviewed Collection, on the topic of Collaborative Practice and Pedagogies. Along with the exciting debut of the Peer Reviewed Collection is a fresh new design that brings the look of the magazine right up to date. A selection of interesting articles on a variety of topics in early childhood will keep you reading every page!

Making space for the peer reviewed articles means some adjustment to our regular content.  You will find the new member list and donor thanks, as well as the full list of AECEO Certified members, in the Winter 2017-2018 issue. We hope to publish the Peer Reviewed Collection in every other issue and the new members and donor thanks will now also be published in every other issue. The Editorial Committee plans to continue developing new, regular eceLINK features that will add interest and value to the publication for AECEO members.

In This Issue:

• Creating Inclusive Early Learning Environments for LGBTQ2+ Families (featured article available to the public) 
  
• Bringing Nature to Niagara’s Youngest Children: Early Childhood Community Development Centre’s Naturalized Playgrounds Project
• Professional Pay and Decent Work Project Update: Mobilizing community voices for professional pay and decent work in the early childhood sector

Peer Reviewed Collection

• (Re)Imagining and (Re)Engaging in Relational Encounters: Communities of Practice for (Re)Vitalizing Pedagogies
• “Good-bye Mr. Raccoon, we’ll miss you!” Supporting children’s explorations of life and death in a forest

Professional Pay and Decent Work Action page!

The AECEO and our Task Force present the Ontario Early Childhood Sector Decent Work Charter.

The AECEO's Professional Pay & Decent Work Campaign has been successfully engaging and organizing hundreds of RECEs, early years staff, parents and community members across Ontario to advocate for quality affordable early years and child care programs where RECEs and staff are well supported with professional pay and decent work. 

Early childhood educators, staff, parents, children and community members can work together to shape the future of Ontario’s early years and child care system. Below are some ways you can participate in the Week of Action!! We will keep you posted as week of action events develop across the province! 

The Ontario Early Childhood Sector Decent Work Charter has been developed by the Association of Early Childhood Educators Ontario (AECEO) Decent Work Taskforce as one of the components to mobilizing a collective effort to achieve greater recognition and improved compensation and working conditions for those employed in the sector.

Ontario Early Childhood Sector Decent Work Charter

We've created a Campaign Tool Kit to support local communities and their members as they engage in campaign actions.

Finding a Home in the World: Migration, Indigeneity, and Citizenship

Ryerson University, Toronto, Canada • October 24 –27, 2017
Preconference workshops and preschool visits • October 23-24

The theme of this year's conference is Finding a Home in the World: Migration, Indigeneity, and Citizenship. Recent events shine new light on a familiar theme – the wrenching displacement of large populations because of war, violence, religious persecution, poverty, environmental disasters, and human-made climate change.

More information

Make Bill 148 meaningful in second reading

An open letter to Premier Wynne, Minister Naidoo-Harris, and Minister Flynn

Ontario Pay Coalition 

As Bill 148 goes into its second reading, the Ontario Equal Pay Coalition calls on Madame Premier, and Ministers Flynn and Naidoo-Harris to close the loopholes in Bill 148 during second reading to ensure that the equal pay provisions deliver meaningful protection for workers. 

This video features prominent leaders from community organizations that are advocating for equal pay and decent work for all early childhood educators and worker's in Ontario, including the AECEO, Equal Pay Coalition, the Atkinson Centre, and the Workers Action Centre.

This video answers the questions: What is decent work? How does decent work impact early childhood educator practice? What are the elements of decent work? How can early childhood educators join the movement for decent work in Ontario?

Video by Subeda Sheekhnur, ECE Student, George Brown College Early Childhood Leadership Degree Program

The Ontario College of Teachers has developed the following new teacher education resources designed to support inquiry into the Ethical Standards for the Teaching Profession and the Standards of Practice for the Teaching Profession:

• Strengthening a Vision: A Critical Discourse on the Ethical Standards for the Teaching Profession
• Exploring the Standards of Practice for the Teaching Profession through Anishinaabe Art
  • Standards of Practice - Anishnaabe Art Posters.

AECEO Launches Professional Pay & Decent Work Campaign Tool Kit

The AECEO's Professional Pay & Decent Work Campaign has been successfully engaging and organizing hundreds of RECEs, early years staff, parents and community members in Ontario. This Campaign Tool Kit will support local Professional Pay Communities of Practice, early years and child care programs, individual RECEs/staff/parents and ECE students as they engage in campaign actions. As the campaign continues to grow we will add more tool kit items to support actions and engagement across the province. 

Early childhood educators, staff, parents, children and community members can work together to shape the future of Ontario’s early years and child care system.

TOOL KIT ITEMS:

Key Campaign Messages

Take the online Pledge

The Association of Early Childhood Educators Ontario (AECEO) is the professional association for early childhood educators (ECEs) in Ontario. We support ECEs in their professional practice and advocate for the recognition and appropriate compensation that early childhood professionals need so that they can provide high quality programs for children and families. Well educated, well paid and competent early childhood educators are fundamental to high quality early years and child care programs that support children and families across the province. Our members work throughout Ontario in programs for young children and their families, including licensed centre based and home based child care, full-day kindergarten, family resource programs, Ontario Early Years Child and Family Centres and as Resource Consultants who provide services and support for children and families with disabilities.

ECEs and early years staff have joined working people across Ontario to make it loud and clear that too many of us are working for low wages in part-time, temporary or contract jobs without employment benefits, workplace protection or the right to form, and keep, a union. For too many Ontario workers, full time work does not guarantee a life above the poverty line. Income and job insecurity keep us from making ends meet. Even with the professionalization of ECEs and the mounting evidence pointing to the immense importance of their work, ECEs have seen a very slow and limited increase in professional recognition through improved compensation and benefits. Low ECE salaries, inconsistent working conditions, and precarious work schedules have resulted in poor morale, job dissatisfaction and high staff turnover. Particularly in licensed child care programs, ECEs are transitioning over to full-day kindergarten, or worse, are leaving the sector altogether despite being passionate about their work. It is the experience of many early years and child care programs across Ontario that qualified ECEs cannot be recruited to work in these under-resourced early childhood environments that serve our youngest children. This is having a significant impact on child care staff consistency, program quality, and sector stability that promises to endure for years if it is not addressed now. 

Read full submission here

Province Appoints Expert Reviewer to Conduct Affordability Study