International Conference on the “New Directions in Early Childhood Education in Turkey: Quality, Access, Equity” in Ankara on 18-19 June 2013 21.06.2013

The International Conference on the “New Directions in Early Childhood Education in Turkey: Quality, Access, Equity” was held in Ankara on 18-19 June 2013, organized by the Ministry of National Education (MoNE) with the technical support of UNICEF Turkey Country Office under European Union (EU), which funded Strengthening Pre-School Education Project. 

Academicians, practitioners, experts in the field, policy makers, decision makers, representatives of public and private institutions and NGOs from Turkey and all over the world shared their experiences to contribute to the strengthening of the political will and inter-sectoral cooperation towards improving quality in Early Childhood Education (ECE) for all children with the view to narrowing down the equity gap and providing universal access to early childhood education in Turkey.

 The main objectives of the meeting included the following points:

• To promote the importance of quality in ECE and of capacity building and partnerships in improving quality towards increasing coverage and closing the equity gap in Turkey.
• To contribute to enhanced policy dialogue between different countries on practices and innovative approaches to develop and expand quality ECE services for all children, particularly for the most disadvantaged children.
• To create a platform to discuss ECE quality framework and to enable Turkish decision-makers, local authorities and practitioners to establish partnership and network with European counterparts through sharing country specific experiences, policies, regulations, challenges, and practices.

Therefore, they highlighted the fact that many progresses have been realized in Turkey during the recent years. However, Quality, Access and Equity should be improved for the development of ECE and to prepare 0 to 6 year-old children and particularly disadvantaged children, to the primary school in a proper way.

Besides, Mehmet DUMAN, UCLG-MEWA General Secretary, chaired the session, titled “Community Based Early Childhood Education Practices in Turkey: Local Partnerships” and stressed the role of local authorities, which serve as a catalyst for the development of Early Childhood Education (ECE) to provide better services for children education.

Mr. DUMAN noted in his speech that; “Turkey has made significant progress in terms of realization of Millennium Development Goals. Despite the fact that differences between rural and urban areas; and some regional and social gender inequalities are observed, Turkey has significantly improved its records of alleviation of poverty, access of everyone to basic education, reducing maternal and infant mortality rates and ensuring environmental sustainability.

However, within the context of overcoming the deficiencies in this regard, it is evident that local authorities, as well as the institutions in our country with a direct mandate on this topic, should assume significant responsibilities.

An environment supported with an educational perspective causes positive effects in the mental, physical, emotional and social development of children.

The more early childhood development is supported and cared about, the more positive traces it will leave on the future learning and lives of our children, and make them successful.

Therefore, childhood development must be seen as an important part of human development, in the course of life, in terms of both time and content. In this regard, local authorities must increase the quality of life and have more decisive and equitable approaches.

Despite the fact that no specific mandate was given to Turkish Local Authorities by law, in the field of education, they need to ensure that pre-school education and community based day-care center models are established especially in disadvantages regions. Furthermore, all the necessary legal regulations must be passed immediately.”