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 […]

Minister Roderic O’Gorman TD welcomes strong commitment from Early Learning and Childcare services to Core Funding for third year running with over 90% of services now signed up. For the third year of operation, Core Funding has increased by 15% to €331 million. The full Press Release can be read […]

Find out more about what the DCEDIY  #Budget2025 package might mean for you here: https://brnw.ch/21wNm7i

Minister Roderic O’Gorman TD has published the first group of early learning and childcare settings to receive a funding boost through the Equal Start scheme. Equal Start, launched earlier this year, is a new, DEIS-style funding model. It provides a set of universal and targeted measures to support access to, […]