Every Victorian child born under a re-elected Andrews Labor Government will start kindergarten a year earlier, including kids in Dandenong.<\/p>\n
Labor will invest almost $5 billion over the next decade to deliver a full 15 hours of three-year-old kinder, helping make sure local kids are ready for school and set for life.<\/p>\n
This will be the largest social, economic and educational reform ever undertaken in early childhood learning in Victoria\u2019s history.<\/p>\n
Labor\u2019s commitment is also good news for local families struggling with the cost of living.<\/p>\n
Right now, many families are forced to scrimp and save to cover the costs of three-year-old kinder \u2013 around $5000 a year for 15 hours \u2013 while the vast majority see their kids miss out.<\/p>\n
Recent research conducted by community service provider Uniting shows that nearly one in five families do not have their children enrolled in early learning because of the cost.<\/p>\n
But under Labor\u2019s plan, around a quarter of Victorian families will pay nothing at all.<\/p>\n
For families with a higher income, the Labor Government will cover 65 per cent of their child\u2019s kindergarten costs, consistent with the current subsidy for four-year-old kinder.<\/p>\n
This represents a saving of at least $3500 for families whose children attend a standalone kinder.<\/p>\n
Those with kids who go to long-day-care will also benefit, with these centres given funding to employ teachers in their three-year-old rooms. Centres that make cost savings due to our investment will be required to pass any savings on to families.<\/p>\n
Under Labor\u2019s plan, every Victorian child will have access to at least five hours of subsidised three-year-old kinder by 2022, progressively scaled up to 15 hours per week over the next decade.<\/p>\n
A re-elected Labor Government will work closely with the early childhood sector, including local councils, to deliver this reform.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Every Victorian child born under a re-elected Andrews Labor Government will start kindergarten a year earlier, including kids in Dandenong. Labor will invest almost $5 billion over the next decade to deliver a full 15 hours of three-year-old kinder, helping make sure local kids are ready for school and set for life. This will be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9725,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8494","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-media-releases"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gabriellewilliams.com.au\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8494","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gabriellewilliams.com.au\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gabriellewilliams.com.au\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gabriellewilliams.com.au\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gabriellewilliams.com.au\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8494"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.gabriellewilliams.com.au\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8494\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9388,"href":"https:\/\/www.gabriellewilliams.com.au\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8494\/revisions\/9388"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gabriellewilliams.com.au\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9725"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gabriellewilliams.com.au\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gabriellewilliams.com.au\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gabriellewilliams.com.au\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}