Newsletter for Early Years and Childcare providers in West Sussex
#3/2025 - Wednesday 22 January 2025
This week's newsletter includes:
- Business Focus: National Apprenticeship Week - nominate your apprentice for an Exceptional Early Years Apprentice Award
- Early Years Conference 2025 - book soon to avoid disappointment
- Training required for settings with children aged under 2 years
- Termly Provider Update
- New website for early years and childcare providers - advance notice
- Childcare Works launches Early Years Provider Toolkit
- Department for Education (DfE) Early Years Provider Roadshows for 2025
- National Professional Qualification for Early Years Leadership (NPQEYL)
- Early Years Training
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Latest Ofsted news and updates here.
National Apprenticeship Week - nominate your apprentice for an Exceptional Early Years Apprentice Award
We are fast approaching National Apprenticeship Week. Between 10 and 16 February 2025, schools, colleges and employers across the country will be celebrating the value, benefit, and opportunity that apprenticeships bring.
We would like to invite you to get involved by nominating your apprentice for an Exceptional Early Years Apprentice Award. This is our way of recognising the incredible impact apprenticeships have on the early years sector.
If you have an apprentice that you would like to celebrate, let us know why and they could win up to the value of £56 to use on any of our early years training course/s (online and face to face), in the next year.
Please tell us in no more than 500 words, what makes your apprentice exceptional and the positive impact they have had on your setting. Remember to include their name, the level of apprenticeship they are undertaking, your name and the name of your setting.
Please send your nomination to Lisa.Guy@westsussex.gov.uk by 5.00pm on Wednesday 5 February 2025. We will announce the winner via this newsletter on Wednesday 12 February 2025.
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Places on the West Sussex Early Years and Childcare Conference are still available. If you want to find out how to enhance your setting practice through playful approaches to learning, book your place now.
There is also a workshop to support personal and staff wellbeing. Two dates are available, including a weekend, to enable as many people as possible to attend. To book, click on the booking link for your specific date below.
If you experience any issues when booking your place, please email: early.years.training@westsussex.gov.uk.
Did you know that if you offer places to children under the age of 2 years, half of all your staff that support this age range must have undertaken training specific to babies (Early Years Foundation Stage, 3.40)? If you have already signed up to offer, or are thinking of offering, Early Years Funded Entitlement for Working Families for children aged under 2 years, this is still a statutory requirement. This applies to settings who have:
- mixed age groups in one room, and
- separate rooms for under 2s.
It is the responsibility of managers/leaders to ensure that the training covers the key aspects of care, learning and development for babies and toddlers. Ofsted may ask for evidence of this training when they next visit. There are self-led e-learning courses for under 2s available on the early years and childcare training and support programme web page.
Have you submitted a Termly Provider Update form lately? We ask early years and childcare providers to complete a provider update form once a term, which amounts to three times a year. The update form is submitted via the Online Provider Portal. The reasons we ask for these updates once per term:
- Families use our website and call us for help to find childcare that meets their needs. Up to date information regarding your provision is important so parents can clearly understand what you offer and what childcare spaces you have available.
- The information you provide could become out of date. It is important you review the information we hold on your provision regularly, to ensure accurate information is displayed on our website.
- If your information is out of date new early years and childcare provision may open in your area unnecessarily. We use your provider and vacancy information to help identify if new early years provision is required.
By submitting a Termly Provider Update you are receiving free advertising for your business on our Family Information Service website, which receives thousands of views per month. If you do not update your details we will remove you from the public list on our website and you could be missing out on free promotion for your business.
In newsletter #34/2024 we let you know about our plans to develop a new website for early years and childcare providers in West Sussex. We have been working on reviewing and updating our existing web content for providers, but also developing new content. We are hoping to launch the new website during week commencing 3 February 2025. Further information and updates regarding the new website will be shared via this weekly newsletter.
Childcare Works have recently launched a new Early Years Toolkit. The purpose of this toolkit is to bring a wealth of knowledge together in one place. It contains information specific to operating childcare provision, plus more general information, including expert marketing, HR, leadership and management, partnership working and more.
Content is organised into six topics:
- business planning,
- business growth,
- running of your childcare provision,
- leadership and management,
- partnership working, and
- SEND and inclusive practice.
Each resource included in the toolkit is available free of charge.
The DfE Early Years Provider Roadshows for group-based setting leaders and managers are returning for 2025.
These roadshows are your opportunity to find out more about current and future policy, delivery and strategy, including Best Start for Life. They will also cover the expansion of childcare to eligible working parents of children aged 9 months and over. You will have the opportunity to share your views, ideas, best practice and the challenges settings face.
The roadshow for the South East is on 30 April 2025 and will be held in Brighton. Please register your interest here.
In newsletter 37/2024, we informed you that there will be a second cohort of NPQEYL for this academic year which will commence in April 2025.
As an early years setting, if you are interested in the NPQEYL, you must have:
- a qualification of at least level 3,
- two years teaching experience, and
- leadership aspiration/experience.
Funding for the spring 2025 cohort will remain the same as for the autumn 2024 cohort. This is available to schools/settings who are identified as being in the top 50% for Pupil Premium intake. If you are an eligible setting for funding for all programmes, you will have received direct communication from Grow Learn Flourish (GLF) West Sussex Teaching School hub.
If you are not considered to be one of these schools, applications are still welcome but there will be a cost associated with the programme. Please see the GLF West Sussex teaching School hub website for costings, more information and links to apply for all programmes.
There is a short deadline for National Professional Qualifications for the spring 2025 cohort. Therefore, we would urge you to apply as soon as possible, but by early February at the latest.
Should you have any questions, please email Kellie Hall on khall1@glfschools.org or Caroline Carroll on caroline.carroll@millais.org.uk.
Throughout our training programme, there is a range of courses aimed towards leaders and managers. Below are some courses coming up in February. To book a course click the course name below. You can also visit our booking portal West Sussex Services for Education and select your required course.
If you experience any issues when booking your course, please email early.years.training@westsussex.gov.uk.
Useful information
We have a range of online training available for you to access for your staff to ensure they have the most up to date information to support them in their role:
Please inform the Family Information Service if your setting needs to close or is re-opening. Email family.info.service@westsussex.gov.uk and include your setting name, Ofsted URN, the date you intend to close/open, and any changes to your operating hours. If you inform us of re-opening, you will be reinstated on the public list and appear on our website www.westsussex.gov.uk/fis.
We would expect you to make contact with your Early Years and Childcare Adviser (EYCA) to talk through your circumstances, where possible, before making the decision to close the setting. If you are not able to make immediate contact with your EYCA then please email your nearest EYCA team using the following email addresses:
Where there are not clearly evidenced reasons why the setting had no option but to close, there could be implications for funding received as per the government guidance.
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We’re committed to providing excellent support to all providers we engage with. Please take a moment to complete our Early Years and Childcare Provider Feedback Survey and let us know about your experiences. Your feedback will help us improve our service and better support settings like yours. You can visit the web page or scan the QR code. |
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#2/2025 (Starting school applications - deadline today; Spring term Early Years Funded Entitlement headcount and Early Years Census 2025 - deadline approaching; Early Years Funded Entitlement for Working Families - code issues resolved; Transition events 2025; Ofsted Early Years (EY) workshop for professionals; Wellbeing and Exercise in Pregnancy Programme - pregnancy and postnatal exercise; Free online festival for families; Race Equality Week 2025; Early Years Training)
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#1/2025 (Cold health alert extended into the weekend for the South East; Mandatory Early Years Census 2025 and spring term Actuals – action required; Childcare Expansion Capital Grant Funding - deadline approaching; Wraparound Childcare Funding Grant - spring term 2025; Annual Admissions Consultation 2026/27; Business opportunity in Walberton; Better Health Start for Life - Top Tips for Teeth; Maths Champions – professional development programme; Early Years Training)
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#51/2024 (Safeguarding focus: Making a referral to WORTH services; Photographing and filming children; West Sussex Early Years and Childcare Conference 2025: Champions of Childhood – Celebrating Early Years Heroes; Starting School Applications - one month to go; Virtual school support groups; The Wellbeing and Exercise in Pregnancy Programme - the benefits of yoga; Fire safety training for early years and childcare providers; Mental health first aid (adult) training)
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#50/2024 (Online Provider Portal downtime; Early Years Funded Entitlement spring term estimate payments; Early Years Funded Entitlement for Working Families - spring term code deadline; Advance notice - mandatory Early Years Census 2025; Final reminder - checking working families eligibility codes webinar; Inclusion Funding - online information updated and availability for 9 months plus; Childcare Expansion Capital Grant Funding - applications open for further projects; Presentations from INCO/SENCO Networks; Bookstart packs - deliveries starting early 2025)
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#49/2024 (Changes to information gathering for SEND Under 5's and Education, Health and Care Needs Assessment, Advanced warning - Online Provider Portal downtime, Emergency closure planning and response for settings, Wraparound childcare funding - last week to apply, Final reminder - Have your say in the Early Years Funded Entitlement (EYFE) Payment Consultation – Stage Two mandatory survey for EYFE providers, Norovirus symptoms and how to prevent the spread of infection, SEND and Inclusion Newsletter - November 2024, Safer sleep for babies and coping with a crying baby, Early Years Training)
Early Years and Childcare newsletter web page.
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