Minister Norma Foley – TD has announced the opening of applications for a new fund to upskill early years staff The Nurturing Skills Learner Fund will cover 90 per cent of the course fees for early years staff who undertake a degree course. Full Press Release: https://brnw.ch/21wRh58

Minister Norma Foley – TD is delighted to announce that additional funding of €100,000 has been secured, on top of last year’s allocation of €250,000, to reflect the growth of Parent and Toddler groups in recent years. The funding can be used for a variety of purposes including children’s toys, […]

Minister Norma Foley – TD today announced the opening of the 2025 Childminding Development Grant. The grant aims to support childminders to enhance quality and safety in their service through the purchase of toys, childcare equipment, safety equipment, equipment to support inclusion and Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Maths (STEAM) […]

Roderic O’Gorman TD today published the 2024 edition of the State of the Nation’s Children (SONC) report. Some of the key findings in the report include: • In 2024, it is estimated that there were 1,232,714 children living in Ireland. This accounted for 22.9% of the total population. Of these […]

An updated version of Aistear: the Early Childhood Curriculum Framework has been prepared by the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) and was published this week. You can access the framework here, the guidance document here and the FAQ document here. The website is available in English and Irish. […]

New Garda Vetting procedures for the ELC and SAC Sector will come into effect on 1 February 2025. Please see the link below for further information:

The Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth  welcomes the launch of a toolkit for including children from birth to 5 years in decision-making. The toolkit has been published by Hub na nÓg, the national centre of excellence and coordination in children and young people’s participation in decision making, […]

Minister Roderic O’Gorman TD has today announced the launch of the €25m Building Blocks Extension Grant scheme for early learning and childcare providers. The Building Blocks Extension Scheme will deliver additional capacity by supporting existing early learning and childcare Core Funding partner services to extend their premises. It will also […]

New figures show how the Government’s free pre-school programme – the Early Childhood Care and Education or ECCE programme – has transformed early learning experiences and development opportunities for young children in this country. Full press release can be accessed here

Today, Minister O’Gorman published Introductory Guidelines to Support the Inclusion of Autistic Children in Early Learning and Care, School-Age Childcare and Childminding Settings. The Guidelines are for early years educators, school-age childcare practitioners and childminders who are currently working to support the meaningful inclusion of autistic children in early learning […]