Please note: this is an archived news article release

This article was published on Thursday, 23 July, 2020. The information contained within may be out of date or inaccurate. News articles and media releases older than 60 days are archived for future reference.

Council’s Early Years Draft Plan out for consultation

The Greater Shepparton Best Start Early Years Plan 2020-2025 is a new six-year plan with the aim of improving learning, health and wellbeing outcomes for children aged 0 to 6 years. Greater Shepparton’s first combined Best Start Early Years Plan was developed in 2006.

The new plan has five key themes – Play, Learn, Thrive, Voice and Share. All themes have a series of measures of success to determine progress or achievements.

Consultation with the Greater Shepparton Best Start Early Years Partnership, specific workgroups, service providers and extensive research and data has informed the development of the plan.

Greater Shepparton has seen great success with its Best Start Early Years Plans, identifying and implementing practice changes or processes within services to make them more accessible and responsive to families.

Through its Best Start Early Years Plan, Council is acknowledging the importance of early childhood through quality early childhood services such as Maternal and Child Health, playgroups, childcare and kindergarten.

“The Greater Shepparton Best Start Early Years Plan 2020-2025 provides the strategic direction and way forward for Council and the local community to continue to prioritise early childhood development and investment,” Mayor Cr Seema Abdullah said.

“Consultation with parents and community members is currently taking place to develop the annual action plan which will detail the activities that will be implemented to achieve the higher level strategies and outcomes documented in the plan.”

The Best Start Early Years Plan 2020-2025 is open for comment from 22 July 2020 - 19 August 2020.

To have your say, visit Council’s website here.

Significant achievements of previous plans include (from 2006 to 2019):

Increase in the number of completed 3.5 year key age and stage visits
Increase in the percentage of completed Maternal and Child Health key age and stage visits in Mooroopna and north Shepparton
Increase in the percentage of completed Maternal and Child Health key age and stage visits for Aboriginal children
Increase in the number of Early Start to Kindergarten enrolments
Increase in breastfeeding rates across Greater Shepparton
An improvement in the AEDC Language Skills domain from 2009 to 2012 after an intensive early years language and literacy focus
Strengthened links with local agencies and organisations.