Who’s minding our child minders?
Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: Child Development on 13 Jan 2010.
With all the talk about expanding preschool enrolment in the country is anyone asking what’s being done about the danger of child abuse and how to keep these centres safe? While the growing numbers of reported child abuse did not necessarily take place in kindergartens and playschools, recent news of an alleged sex offender operating a kindy raised alarm.
In Malaysia the thriving business of kindergartens, playschools, and daycare for kids provide an invaluable service catering to young parents whose busy careers leave little time for junior. The Child Care Centre Act regulates this army of childminders although kindergartens and nurseries operated by the Education Ministry are governed by a different Act.
Since its implementation, this provision requires home-based centres that receive less than 10 children and any institution that has more than 10 children to be registered before they are allowed to operate. Unfortunately enforcement is so lax and the need so great few parents suspect their children may be left in the care of strangers in unregistered centers. A report in The Nutgraph looks at the cabinet-approved Child Protection Policy (CPP) rolled out in July 2009 and examines how implementation falls short of its intentions:
Notwithstanding the government’s efforts, PH Wong (child advocate and Childline Malaysia project director) says a large number of childcare centres and kindergartens are still not registered with the authorities. She says the number of registered centres has almost halved from five years ago. This means that many children are attending unregistered centres.
And even for registered centres, there is no formal accreditation. “We have been pushing for a national quality accreditation system for early childhood centres for more than 10 years, but that has not been implemented yet,” says PH Wong, (child advocate and Childline Malaysia project director).
(United Nations Children’s Fund representative to Malaysia) Youssouf Omar says that parents and guardians must play their part and ensure they do not put children in situations where they could be at risk.
“Parents and guardians should be proactive and ask to check the centre’s licence, as well as ask whether it has a formal child protection policy. In addition, [they must also be] aware of changes in children’s behaviour and look out for signs that the children may not be well protected or cared for in the centre,” explains Youssouf.
By requesting to see a centre’s child protection policy, he says it would create a demand for such policies. “By boycotting places that are not registered, parents can influence the practices of childcare centres and kindergartens,” he adds.
Read the whole story here.
For a brief write-up about kindergarten licensing procedure go here.
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