A new website has just been launched that allows comparison of early years education systems across Europe.
"Eurypedia" is an online European encyclopedia of national education systems, run by the Eurydice network of Education Ministries in 33 European countries. While the Wikipedia-style encyclopedia is broad in scope - encompassing the whole education system - it includes lots of useful resources on early childhood education systems.
The sections on Ireland provide useful reference material, but the website will be particularly useful in helping comparisons of Irish Government policies for early care and education with policies in other countries. Cross-country comparisons like this are crucial if we are to push for policy improvements in Ireland. We need to be constantly reminding policy makers how far Ireland still needs to go if we are to catch up with many of our European neighbours.
One section of the Eurypedia website is dedicated to early childhood education and care. It provides an overview for each European country of the organisation of early care and education services, as well as Government policies in the area.
In addition, there is information on early years systems in other sections of the website, such as Funding (e.g. subsidies for parents), Teachers and Education Staff, Quality Assurance, and Special Education Needs Provision. Material can be viewed by topic and by country.
-reprinted from Start Strong Ireland