A non-profit nursery: taking change in its stride

What does the expansion of ‘free’ childcare mean to different early years providers? workingmums.co.uk is speaking to providers in different parts of the country about how they are preparing for the extension of 15 ‘free’ hours to eligible working parents of nine month olds from September in England.

Hewett under 5s in Norwich is a small, independent, term-time only, not for profit provider. Its joint directors Rebecca West and Amy Owen took over in January. The nursery has been open since 1974 and was set up by the headmaster of the Hewett School for secondary school students studying childcare. It can take 32 children a day – 20 preschoolers and 12 in the baby room. Currently it has 39 children on its roll, but not all of them come in at the same time so it is not over capacity.

West says it has definitely seen more interest in advance of the extension of ‘free’ childcare. Mostly it is current parents taking advantage of the offer, but there are some new babies too whereas usually there is usually more demand for pre-schoolers at this time of year.

West is confident the nursery can meet most of the demand as many of the pre-school group are moving up to school, although she says some parents who want to increase their hours are having to wait. It is unable to expand space-wise because of its current location which it rents from Hewett School.

The East of England is one of the childcare deserts identified in recent reports and West says a local preschool has closed down so they have had some of those parents coming to them. Other nurseries are also closing down, but West says there are other options for parents and they are not ‘banging down their door’.

Teachers

Because Hewett under 5s is term time only, many of the parents are teachers. Other children are only on the subsidised hours. However, the nursery has managed to keep fees down to 40 pounds for a full day and 20 pounds for a half day and West doesn’t anticipate this changing as they don’t have to turn a profit. Parents do have to bring lunches and nappies, however. She adds that the nursery doesn’t have any current staffing problems either – recruitment and retention is a real issue for many childcare providers. They have just employed two new people. West says they have been ‘very lucky’ with the 11 staff they have [including the co-directors]. 

They also have a large garden at the back of the nursery which the pre-schoolers use and a small one at the front for younger children. The focus is on free-flowing learning through play. “We are very much adult-guided and child-led,” says West. They hope to train a member of staff to run a forest school soon. The nursery has recently had two children with special needs and has a few others who have not yet been diagnosed. Both West and her co-director are SENCOs and West is keen for all the staff to have basic training in special needs. However, she says it has been very hard to find the right course in her area.

All in all, the nursery feels ready for the changes ahead and confident that it can cope, but due to its hours and the fact that around 90% of parents are teachers it is in a very fortunate situation.

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