Some community-based preschools have been forced to raise fees and cut places for younger children due to a change in state government funding, an Illawarra centre director claims.
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Community preschools will no longer receive funding for three-year-olds unless they are from low income or Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander families due to a policy change that came into effect this year.
Funding will now only be available for children in their year prior to starting school, a move that has drawn anger from centre operators.
Margaret Gleeson, director at Keiraville Community Preschool, said the funding chop had forced the centre to reduce the number of three-year-olds accepted for enrolment this year, while capping those that did make the cut to just two days.
But she said her main concern was the potential impacts on children most in need of early intervention.
"Often it takes a while to identify whether a child has a learning difficulty or a special need, it then takes time for the family to accept that, then to get the child booked in for assessment so early intervention can happen, it's a slow process," she said. "That means that it compromises the early intervention possibility for lots of children."
But all three-year-olds should have access to preschool education, Ms Gleeson said, with most children gaining huge developmental and social benefits from those early years spent in the classroom.
Ms Gleeson said the decision to remove funding for three-year-olds would have major implications for most NSW preschools, affecting each in different ways.
A Department of Education spokesman said the new funding model aimed to increase the number of children able to access preschool while reducing fees.
"This has proven effective, as the proportion of four and five year olds enrolled in NSW government-funded community preschools increased from 70 per cent in 2013 to 73 per cent in 2014," he said.
The state government had allocated $5.6 million in capital funding and also launched a program to improve access to preschool for children with disabilities from age three and up.
mwebster@fairfaxmedia.com.au