Alberta Resource Center for Quality Enhancement

ACYS - Child Care Symposium – May 23, 2009

ARCQE would like to send a cheer of congratulations to the 2009 recipients of the Child Care Professional Awards of Excellence (http://alberta.ca/acn/200905/2602368FB311A-C666-AF8E-2359D470E0B7EBFF.html) and thank you for continuing to raise the bar on quality care in Alberta.  ARCQE was honored to deliver our training on the Master Players Approach to Superhero Play to over 75 attendees of the symposiums.  ARCQE would like to thank ACYS for including ARCQE in this innovative and exciting professional opportunity

Frequently following workshops, ARCQE receives requests from participants for resources and/or mentoring services aimed at strengthening individual professional practice.  In a concerted effort towards continuous quality improvement, ARCQE is pleased to share that it is now working on a number of new items to support front line practitioners in transcending “theory to practice” through services and resources that further build upon information provided via ARCQE workshops.  Watch for these new & exciting items coming soon.

New Service: Valuing Cultural Diversity - Reflections on Practice:  Similarly to the CIS service, and line of ECERS services, ARCQE has now established a service to assist programs meaningfully review policies and practice applications in integrating cultural diversity across all aspects of the agency.

New Resources: 
Diversity Resource Kit that includes an array of materials to support professionals in applying knowledge of diversity as it applies to all aspects of programming, administration and creative environments.
Open-Ended Art Kit for practitioners which offers both materials, and best practice information relative to the ARCQE Open Ended Art workshop, with hands-on implementation strategies.

New Service:  Individualized Mentor Services
Noted as one of the top two priorities from the sector following the “Caring for our Futures” symposium held by ARCQE in November of 2008 ARCQE is pleased to introduce support services for professionals looking for individualized mentor services which they can subscribe to as a means of strengthening and supporting individual caregiver practice.  Based on the national standards developed by the Canadian Child Care Federation (CCCF), the Occupational Standards service offers both the support of a personal mentor on a weekly basis through provision of observations and debrief & strategy reflections.  This service also provides professionals with the Occupational Standards booklet published by CCCF.

In August 2009, ARCQE received a contract to provide technical support to programs participating in the pilot project for Out of School Care accreditation.  As a means of developing and delivering services specific to the needs of this sector, Dawn Eagles was hired in the dual role as Coach and Resource Coordinator.  As the lead on this initiative, Dawn’s focus included attending advisory committee meetings during the development phase of the new OOSC accreditation model, creation of parallel materials and services for the school age care community, and on-site support in assisting programs work through the accreditation self-study process.  Much about the way we will support this part of the sector with accreditation was learned through this process! 

On a formal level, Dawn has worked in School Age Care for most of her career after graduating from Early Childhood Development and has a passion for working with children 6-12 years of age.  Dawn was a tutor for many years for MacEwan’s Introduction to School Age Care distance delivery course and has led many workshops at MacEwan’s Child Care Conference in the area of School Age Care.  She is looking forward with anticipation to her involvement supporting the OOSC community in this new and exciting direction as she moves officially into the role of Coach in the Edmonton and area region.