Research On Development Of Quality Assurance Of Preschool Education In Australian Federal Government (1983-2014)

Quality is the core and life of education. How to promote the quality of preschool education has become an important goal of its development in every country. The Australian federal government tried to intervene and lead the quality control of preschool institutions by means of certification, standards and assessment and has formed an unique approach for quality assurance of preschool education after going through stages of germination, innovation, development and reform. Australia is the world’s first to implement national standards and its inclusion in the legal system for the quality of preschool education. A unified national standard will help improve the quality of preschool education institutions, and the legal system is an effectively guarantee to the implementation of the standards. In contrast, China’s relevant policies, system and specific measures for preschool education quality are far away from perfect, problems include unclear subjects, vague standards and insufficient protection. Thus to study the Australian federal government’s preschool education quality assurance can provide valuable reference and inspiration for the Chinese government to promote the quality of preschool education.This study elaborates on the quality assurance of preschool education in Australia vertically and horizontally. The historical stages of the promotion of the standards are studied horizontally in perspective of quantity and quality: the first stage(before 1980s) was the germination stage; the second stage(1983-1996) was a time of innovation when quantity was given more priority; in the third stage(1997-2008), the development stage, importance was attached to quality with further development of quantity; the fourth stage(2009-2014) featured pursuit of high quality. Horizontally, dimensions such as certification, standards and evaluation system were studied as the main lines to ensure the quality assurance system。Specific initiatives in each stage are researched and analyzed based on historical data. This research is divided into six patrs.In the introduction, the author reviews relevant literature, defines the core concepts, expounds the research ideas, research methods and significance, clears the research questions, points out the innovations and shortages of this research.The first chapter studies the germination period of the preschool education quality assurance. During the colonial period, the Australian preschool education was in a free state of disorder. After Australia’s independence, the federal government had no right to say according to the constitution. With the breaking out of the two world wars and the post-war economic crisis, exchanges increased among the originally separated Australian States and the convergence of interests phenomenon became more obvious. State governments overwhelmed by governmental business began to transfer some formerly state authority to the federal government, which resulted in the gradually strengthened and expanded federal government power. As was reflected in the field of preschool education, the federal government took a series of initiatives to strengthen the standard management of preschool education such as the establishment of Lady Gowrie child centres, Association for Preschool Child Development and the introduction of Child Care Act. In this historical stage, the federal government began to change its state of omission in preschool education with initial intervention in the orderly development of preschool education, which is the important premise to the federal government’s quality assurance.The second chapter elaborates on the initial stage of the quality assurance. As a result of the increase of population and working women after World War II and the change of family patterns, the demand for preschool institutions increased. Federal government frequently introduce policies aiming at increasing the number of preschool education degrees and provided financial aids to promote private day care institutions. The surge in quantity aroused a growing concern about the quality, calling on the federal government to strengthen the management of the preschool education institutions at the national level. In this regard, the federal government lift the curtains of the Australian preschool education quality assurance by establishing national preschool education certification institution and the day care quality guarantee system. In this historical stage, the focus of the federal government was on the quantity to meet the needs of parents and children enrolled, thus a quantity-preferred stage.The third chapter is about the development stage of the quality assurance. Affected by political factors, the federal government adjusted the financial aid policies to preschool education and public day care institutions operating subsidies are removed. Large amount of funds were transferred to private day care institutions and led to the surge of chained preschool educational institutions, which were profit-oriented and aggravated the contradiction between the quality and quantity. To respond to the diversification of preschool institutions and the social calls for a quality preschool education, the federal government enhanced the intensity and scope of its supervision to the service of preschool education institutions, the objects of quality assurance expanded from day care to family day care and outside school hours care, with establish family day care quality guarantee system and outside school hours care quality guarantee system,with reforms to the evaluating methods. In this historical period, the federal government continued to increase the number of preschool education institutions and began to focus on quality improvement, thus a quantity-increased and quality-concerned stage.The fourth chapter elaborates on the reform stage of the quality guarantee system. In order to better achieve the unity of fairness, efficiency and quality, the federal government built a unified National Quality Standard for various types of institutions and stopped the use of independent quality certification. Meanwhile two regulations, namely Education and Care Services National Regulations and Education and Care Services National Law Act were implemented to include the certification, assessment and licensing of the preschool education into legislation. The new qualification system was mandatory and ensured that all preschool education institutions should be assessed regularly to maintain an operating qualification. In this historical stage, the federal government introduced the quality standards, curriculum standards and teacher training standards for the first time at the national level, which marked the beginning of the federal government’s authority in assuring the quality of preschool education, thus a quality-pursuit stage.Conclusion part is on the characteristics of the quality assurance system, analysis to its historical experience and the enlightenment to China. In more than 40 years afterwards, since the 1972 when the Child Care Act(Child Care Act) first regulated the federal government’s duty to the preschool education, the Australian federal government constantly revised and innovated preschool education quality assurance concepts and modes, adjusted the direction of the system, effectively promoted the quality of preschool education and enhance equal opportunity and fair quality in order to cater for the social demand and lead the trend of the times in gaming with stakeholders of preschool education. Under the continuous strengthening of the Australian federal government, the quality assurance system has experienced a process of continuous improvement and innovation namely, from a role from the edge to the core as for the quality policy, from decentralization to centralization in terms of management mode and differentiation to uniform in terms of the system. During this process, the strong intervention of the federal government also encountered some problems. For example, how to seek a balance between mandatory and incentive mechanism and how to regulate the third party intermediaries are issues require further discussion. The historical experience of the Australian federal government provides useful reference and inspiration as to accelerate the preschool education legislation, to establish a cooperation community of preschool education quality assurance, to develop a national standard for preschool education quality, and to upgrade the assessment system of preschool education in China.