NSCC early childhood education program gets $283,000 boost
The early childhood education diploma program at the Nova Scotia Community College will be expanded.
The province will spend $283,000 over the next three years to add 60 seats to the program at NSCC’s Akerley campus in Dartmouth.
“The demand for early childhood education training has grown across the province, especially in the Halifax Regional Municipality,” said Zach Churchill, minister of Education and Early Childhood Development, in a news release. “These new seats will help to reduce waitlists at NSCC, while addressing the long-term recruitment challenges of this profession.”
The move is part of the Education Department’s focus on pre-primary education and the regulated child-care sector in recent years. The Liberals set aside $10.2 million to expand preprimary classes in its 2019-20 budget and $67 million, which includes a federal contribution of $11 million, was spent on regulated child-care sector.
NSCC president Don Bureaux welcomed the latest funding.
“At Nova Scotia’s community college, our programming is always evolving to reflect the demands within the province’s workforce,” he said in the province’s news release. “We are pleased to help address the needs the government has identified in this important sector by adding 60 new seats in our ECE program studies in Metro.”
The 60 new NSCC early childhood education seats are on top of 135 that were opened in July 2018.
The money for these seats comes from the three-year, $35-million Canada-Nova Scotia Early Learning and Child Care Agreement signed in January 2018 with the federal government.
The early childhood education diploma program is offered in eight communities across Nova Scotia.