Circular 2010/17 - Early childhood education funding

Date November 2010 | Circular number 2010/17 | Category Funding

Early childhood education funding

This circular is about The November 2010 ECE Funding Payment.

This circular replaces 2010/10.

The action required is

• read this circular in conjunction with the Early Childhood Education Funding Handbook (2010 update)
• file this circular and funding advice for future reference.

It is intended for All early childhood education (ECE) services (in particular, the management of these services).

For further information
On funding matters (either ECE Funding or Equity Funding), please contact:
Resourcing Division Contact Centre
Ministry of Education
PO Box 1666
Wellington 6140.
Phone 04 463 8383 Fax 04 463 8374
Email resourcing@minedu.govt.nz [no spam]

On licensing or general operational matters contact your local Ministry of Education office.

Early childhood funding subsidy: November 2010 payment

Correctly completed RS7 Early Childhood Funding claim forms (RS7 forms) returned by Friday, 8 October 2010 will be assured of payment overnight on Monday, 1 November 2010. Advice notices outline how payments were calculated.

Funding months

The recently submitted RS7 form data was used to calculate entitlements for the following months:

October 2010

Advance payments for October 2010 were paid in July 2010. the wash-up payment for October 2010 will be paid in March 2011.

Late claims

Correctly completed RS7 forms received after Friday, 8 October 2010 but before Monday, 8 November 2010 will be paid overnight on Monday, 22 November 2010.

Return dates of RS7 forms

The Resourcing Division thanks all services who returned their RS7 forms to the Ministry by the due date. We understand that meeting this deadline can be difficult and places pressure on services. These deadlines are in place to allow the Resourcing Division:

• sufficient time to process RS7 forms, including checking and correcting errors on forms, and contacting services for the correct information (where applicable)
• to guarantee funding to services who have returned their forms on time.

RS7 errors

Any errors made on the RS7 forms may result in differences between expected and actual payments, or funding delays.
Some specific errors were also made in previous funding periods. Please refer to past claim form errors and check all calculations carefully to ensure the same errors are not repeated before submitting the RS7.

Filling out the RS7 forms

Please ensure all RS7 forms have been fully checked before submission. Note that the Resourcing Division does not make courtesy calls for the following RS7 errors:

Payments

Payments are based on the information provided on the RS7 form.

Submitting amended RS7s

Services that have made errors on their RS7’s are able to submit amended forms to the Ministry. In order for amended RS7’s to be processed, the declaration must be signed and dated again.

Note: If the declaration of an amended RS7 form has not be signed and dated, the amendment will not be processed.

Enquiries regarding the bulk funding payment

Due to privacy laws and difficulties verifying the identity of the person making the enquiry, the Ministry of Education is no longer able to provide payment totals over the telephone or via email. Advice notices are posted to services on the payment date.

Requests for confirmation of funding

Effective from 1 January 2010, the Ministry no longer sends payment confirmation notices to services, service providers or their banks.

Changes to the early childhood education (ECE) funding handbook

The ECE funding handbook has been updated to include a number of changes announced in Budget 2010.

The updated handbook includes:

• the removal of the 80-99% and 100% funding rates in Appendix One effective from 1 February 2010
• a change to the optional charge rule effective from 1 February 2010
• the inclusion of New Zealand qualified and registered primary teachers for funding purposes effective from 1 November 2010
• the new home-based educator qualification requirements for quality rate funding.

The updated ECE funding handbook was published on 30 September 2010.

More information on these changes are described in further detail in this circular.

The Handbook also had some major changes, published on 23 March. Other forms used by ECE services were also updated and can be found at www.minedu.govt.nz/eceforms. Please ensure you are using the most up-to-date versions.

Self-paced learning and more information to help ECE services with funding and 20 Hours ECE can be found at www.lead.ece.govt.nz. Self-paced learning CD’s can also be requested from your local Ministry of Education office.

Other funding information

Recognising New Zealand qualified and registered primary teachers in ECE

Changes announced in Budget 2010 included an amendment to ECE funding rules.

From 1 November 2010, for funding purposes, ‘registered teachers’ will include both teachers with recognised ECE qualifications and New Zealand qualified and registered primary teachers. This means that New Zealand qualified and registered primary teachers can be in your service’s staff hour count for the 1 March 2011 payment.

This changes does not affect:

• staffing requirements set out in the Education (Early Childhood Centres) Regulations 1998 or the Education (Early Childhood Services) Regulations 2008
• person responsible requirements.

Further information about this change is available from www.minedu.govt.nz/Budget2010ECE or by contacting the Ministry of Education Resourcing Division Contact Centre.

Funding and teacher registration lapses

Where a registered teacher’s registration lapses, they may continue to be counted as registered on the Staff Hour Count from the date they submitted their application for registration renewal to the New Zealand Teachers Council. This period must not exceed three months. Services accessing this provision must keep a copy of the completed application, which must be signed and dated by the centre supervisor or manager. Any teacher applying for registration renewal must provide their employer service with a copy of the completed application.

If, after three months, registration renewal has not been approved the teacher must be counted as ‘other’ on the Staff Hour Count. Should registration renewal be declined, the Ministry will recover any associated funding.

Service providers

The Ministry will link together services under the same ownership into one service provider. There can only be one nominated bank account for each organisation for the payment of Ministry funding. Any overpayments are deducted from the total funding paid to the organisation.

Refer to the first page of the RS7 form under the ‘Service Funding Information’ heading for service provider details.

More information is available in section 2-4 of the ECE Funding Handbook (2010 update).

Link between funding and the RS61

A number of new funding conditions were introduced on 1 October 2009 that are reflected in the latest ECE Funding Handbook (2010 update). One of the conditions is that funding may be withheld in part or in full where the ECE service has not returned its accurately completed RS61 Annual Statistics form to the Ministry by the due date.

Note: the RS61 is sent out to services in late May.

Funding and the financial reporting requirements for the financial year ending in 2009

ECE Services that do not comply with the Ministry’s financial reporting requirements may have their funding withheld in part or in full. The audited financial statements for the financial year ending in 2009 were due by 30 June 2010. Services that have not yet provided a copy of their audited financial statements will have their advance funding withheld from 1 November 2010.

Information on the annual financial reporting requirements, including the deadline for submitting documentation to the Ministry is outlined in an annual Education Circular “Information on financial reporting requirements for early childhood education services”, and chapter 12 of the ECE Funding Handbook (2010 update).

Recovery of early childhood education funding

The Ministry may recover Early Childhood Education Funding from services or organisations that do not meet the requirements outlined in the ECE Funding Handbook (2010 update). For more information about the circumstances where the Ministry may recover funding, please refer to section 2-7 of the ECE Funding Handbook (2010 update).

Frequent absence rule

Some services have been applying the Frequent Absence Rule incorrectly by claiming funding past the end of the third month without the enrolment agreement being updated to show the child’s correct hours of attendance.

Note: funding for absences in the fourth month must not be claimed and the enrolment agreement must be changed to match the child’s attendance.

More information is available from section 6-7 of the ECE Funding Handbook (2010 update).

The purpose of EC20 applications

EC20 applications are to be used by services taking up 20 Hours ECE for the first time. Existing services can opt into 20 Hours ECE at any time but will only be advance funded for 20 Hours ECE on one of the major funding runs (1 March, 1 July, and 1 November).

Note: Each EC20 is assessed and payment made on a case by case basis.

20 Hours ECE reminder

Reminder

It has come to our attention that some home-based care services are not correctly applying the 20 Hours ECE rules.

Charging fees

Parents must not be charged fees for hours where 20 Hours ECE has been claimed. This includes situations where parents directly pay educators and then receive reimbursement by the service.

Optional charges

While services may charge an optional charge (request for a payment that parents may choose whether or not to make) for a specific purpose there must be no penalty imposed for parents who choose not to make payment. Once an agreement to pay has been reached then services may enforce payment.

Optional charges must apply to a specific purpose, which could be one off or ongoing. Optional charges for 20 Hours ECE hours may only be requested for:

• aspects of provision that are not required by regulation
• additional staff beyond the minimum regulated adult:child ratios, or
• items that parents may either provide for their own children or pay for the service to provide.

Record keeping requirements

To provide a clear audit trail all services must keep records of all fees, donations, optional charges and wages parents pay to the service / educator. Records of optional charge agreements must be part of the enrolment record.

There must be pay records for an educator when the parent pays the educator directly and the child is funded at the 20 Hours ECE funding rate. It must be possible for the Ministry of Education to assess if the 20 Hours ECE funding rules have been correctly applied in all instances.

More information

More information about optional charges can be found in section 4-3 of the ECE Funding Handbook (2010 update) or on www.lead.ece.govt.nz.

Services with 80% registered teachers

Changes to funding for services with over 80% registered teachers

The Government has agreed that effective 1 February 2011 the top two bands – for services with 80-99% and 100% registered teachers – will be removed, and a new 80%+ rate will be introduced in their place. This change is to align with the revised target for 80% registered teachers in teacher-led ECE services by 2012, and will result in lower rates of subsidy funding for services which have 80% or more registered teachers. Because of this change, no more services will be able to move up to the 80-99% and 100% bands from November 2010.

Services currently funded at either the 80-99% or 100% rate should note that advance funding for November, December and January will be paid at their current rate, and advance funding for February 2011 will be paid at the new 80%+ rate.

These changes do not affect:

• sessional kindergartens - these services are required by law to have 100% registered teachers. They will continue to be funded at the 100% rate.
• parent-led services and home-based services - these services do not use the staff hour count for funding purposes.

Further information is available from www.minedu.govt.nz/Budget2010ECE or by contacting the Ministry’s Resourcing Division Contact Centre.

Funding rates

Please refer to the enclosed flyer for the November 2010 funding period early childhood education funding rates.

Equity Funding

General information

For background information on Equity Funding (including guidelines for reporting and expenditure) please refer to the ECE Funding Handbook (2010 update).

Equity Funding calculations

The November 2010 payment will include Equity Funding based on the early childhood service’s actual entitlement for June 2010 to September 2010.

Equity rates

Refer to the enclosed flyer for the Equity Funding rates per funded child hour, and the Equity Funding monthly grants for the November 2010 funding period.

Annual review of Equity Review Index (EQI)

Licensed, community-based services may apply to have their EQI reviewed in October each year. Application forms can be obtained by contacting the Resourcing Division Contact Centre or by downloading a copy from the Ministry of Education’s website www.minedu.govt.nz/eceforms.

Applications for this year close on Friday 5 November 2010.

New services and the Equity Index (EQI)

If you are a community-based service that opened 1 April 2010 and 30 September 2010 will be sent a new service application pack by March 2011. The information collected during this process will be used to calculate your service’s Equity Index. Funding will be back-dated to when your service opened.

Further advice (key contacts)

ECE regulatory requirements

For further information or guidance on the early childhood education regulatory requirements, please contact your local Ministry of Education office (refer to www.minedu.govt.nz/Contact for contact details).

ECE funding

For further information on the changes to the early childhood education funding system, please contact the Ministry’s Resourcing Contact Centre on:

Tel 04 463 8383
Fax 04 463 8374
Email resourcing@minedu.govt.nz [no spam]
Postal Address PO Box 1666, Wellington, New Zealand, 6140.

Children with special education needs

The Early Intervention Service within the Ministry of Education’s Special Education Group works with young children with special education needs, their families, and early childhood services. This service is available to children from birth until they are settled into school.

Teacher registration

For further information or guidance about teacher registration, contact the:

New Zealand Teachers' Council
Tel 04 471 0852
Fax 04 471 0870
Email inquiries@teacherscouncil.govt.nz [no spam]
Physical Address 93 The Terrace, Wellington, New Zealand
Postal Address PO Box 5326, Wellington, New Zealand.

Inland Revenue Business and Tax Advice Services

For advice on business matters, tax and/or record-keeping, contact the:

Inland Revenue Business and Tax Advice Services on 0800 377 774.

Issued by

John Clark, Group Manager Resourcing, Resourcing Division, Te Wāhanga Whakarato Rawa

National Office, 45 – 47 Pipitea Street, Thorndon
P O Box 1666, Wellington, New Zealand
Te 04 463 8383, fax 04 463 8374