The Minister for Training and Skills and Higher Education has called on Victorians to consider a career in early childhood education as two teaching qualifications are set to be added to the TAFE free course list in 2020.
The Minister, Gayle Tierney said the childcare courses would be added to the free TAFE course list to support the rollout of the Government’s ‘kindergarten for three-year-old’s’ scheme next year.
Ms Tierney said the Government had invested $28.5 million in the Certificate III in Early Childhood Education and Care and Diploma of Early Childhood Education and Care to make them tuition fee-free for eligible students in 2020.
“The increased demand for qualified early childhood educators is due to the roll-out of the biggest reform in early childhood education in our state’s history, the introduction of universal three-year-old kinder,” Ms Tierney said.
“The reform is expected to create more than 6,000 new early childhood education jobs by 2029,” she said.
“For anyone who has considered working in kinder or childcare, this is the perfect time to enroll in early childhood education at TAFE.”
Ms Tierney said that 36,000 students had signed up to the Free TAFE initiative between January and the end of September this year – a 90 per cent increase compared with the same period last year.
Further information about Free TAFE Early Childhood courses can be accessed at this PS News link.
