Preschool Education, Australia methodology

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Reference period
2020
Released
23/04/2021

Explanatory notes

Introduction

This publication contains statistics on children enrolled in and attending preschool programs across Australia in 2020. The statistics were compiled from data collected through the National Early Childhood Education and Care Collection (the collection). The collection includes data about service providers and children. 

The Australian Government and the state and territory governments share responsibility for early childhood education (ECE). ECE programs are administered through a range of government and non-government service providers. In 2007, the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) established a partnership between the Australian Government and the state and territory governments to encourage reform in education, skills and early childhood development.

Since late 2008 the provision of ECE has been supported through National Partnership Agreements. From 2013 these National Partnership Agreements extended coverage to support Universal Access to Early Childhood Education in the year before full-time school.

The collection was established in 2010 to improve the quality of ECE data required for reporting under National Partnership Agreements. Data from the collection also supports national ECE reporting through the Report on Government Services and the National Indigenous Reform Agreement.

Preschool program

For the purposes of the collection, a preschool program is defined as a structured, play based learning program, delivered by a degree qualified teacher, aimed primarily at children in the year or two before they commence full-time schooling. A preschool program can be delivered in a variety of settings such as stand-alone preschools, preschools co-located as part of a school (both government and non-government), and centre based day care (CBDC) services (formerly known as long day care). A child may attend both a preschool and a separate or adjoined child care facility, such as family day care, outside school hours care, vacation care, in-home care and occasional care services. Participation in preschool is not compulsory and is influenced by parental preference and other factors, such as school starting age in the particular jurisdiction.

Preschool programs are referred to by a variety of other terms across state and territories. Preschool age entry requirements also differ across states and territories. These differences are summarised in the following table:

Program Terminology and Age Entry Requirements by State and Territory
JurisdictionPreschool programTransition to primary school Foundation year (Year prior to year 1)
 ProgramAge of entrySchool yearAge of entry
New South Wales (a)PreschoolGenerally 4 and 5 year oldsKindergarten5 by 31 July
Victoria (b)Kindergarten4 by 30 AprilPreparatory (Prep)5 by 30 April
QueenslandKindergarten4 by 30 JunePreparatory (Prep)5 by 30 June
Western AustraliaKindergarten4 by 30 JunePre Primary5 by 30 June
South Australia (c)Preschool4 by 1 MayReception5 by 1 May
TasmaniaKindergarten4 by 1 JanuaryPreparatory5 by 1 January
Australian Capital TerritoryPreschool4 by 30 AprilKindergarten5 by 30 April
Northern Territory (d)Preschool4 by 30 JuneTransition5 by 30 June

a. New South Wales subsidises early access to community preschool for 3 year old Aboriginal children and 3 year old children from low-income families. In New South Wales, all licensed children’s services for under 6 year olds (who have not commenced Kindergarten) are required to offer programs that meet children’s educational and developmental needs.
b. In Victoria, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and children known to child protection are eligible for free kindergarten through Early Start Kindergarten funding if they are aged 3 by 30 April of the year in which they are enrolled.
c. South Australia provides early access to Department funded preschool for children who are Aboriginal or under the Guardianship of the Minister after their 3rd Birthday. The compulsory school starting age in South Australia is 6 years at the oldest.
d. In the Northern Territory, children living in very remote areas can attend preschool from the age of three, provided a parent/guardian accompany the child and remain with them at each session until they reach the age of three years and six months.
Source: Report on Government Services 2020.

Scope and coverage

The scope of the Collection consists of all service providers delivering a preschool program to children aged 3 to 6 years (inclusive) enrolled during the reference period.

A service provider is considered to be in-scope if it was providing a structured, play based learning program, delivered by a degree qualified teacher, aimed at children in the year or two before they commence full-time schooling (a preschool program) during the reference period.

All children who at 1 July in the collection year were aged 3 to 6 years (inclusive) and were enrolled in a preschool program during the reference period are in-scope. To be considered enrolled, the child must have attended the preschool program for at least one hour during the reference period (including attended an early childhood education program online or remotely due to COVID-19 impacts), or be absent due to illness or extended holiday leave or due to COVID-19 impacts and expected to return.

To achieve comprehensive coverage, data were sourced from the Australian Government, state and territory education departments and the Catholic Education Office of the Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn. The data are sourced from administrative collections, supplemented where necessary to improve the coverage of service providers not otherwise captured due to funding, regulation or licensing arrangements. The coverage in each state and territory for the 2020 collection is described in Appendix 3 - Jurisdictional data quality statements.

Data quality and comparability

To ensure national comparability, all jurisdictions were required to follow national data standards. The Early Childhood Education and Care National Minimum Data Set (ECEC NMDS) is a set of national data standards established by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) together with the ABS, the Department of Education, Skills and Employment, and state and territory departments responsible for ECE. More information on the ECEC NMDS can be found on the AIHW website.

Appendix 3 - Jurisdictional data quality statements details if and where jurisdictions were unable to align their collection methods with the ECEC NMDS. Issues affecting data comparability between the states and territories are included as footnotes and/or explanatory notes within this publication.

Statistics in this release may not be fully comparable with previous releases due to differences in coverage and methodologies. Caution should therefore be used when comparing the data over time. Key methodology changes and impacts on data quality over time include:

From 2018, and previously from 2016, the ABS has improved the approach to data linkage in the NECECC to enhance the accuracy of child counts. That is, improvements were made to the way records were linked (when representing the same child), within data provided by a jurisdiction, or across CBDC data provided by both the Australian Government and jurisdictions. These changes reduced over-counts of children. Ongoing improvements to the data linkage methodology may continue over time.

From 2018, the Australian Government implemented the new Child Care Subsidy System (CCSS), replacing the older Child Care Management System (CCMS). From 2016, the Australian Government expanded the strategy for identifying children in the CCMS. As a result, all children at CBDCs (of the appropriate age) are recorded as attending a preschool program. This has particularly affected the count of children aged 3 years enrolled in a preschool program. Prior to 2016 the Australian Government imputed attendance data in the CCMS data extracted for the NECECC to factor for under reporting by provider.

From 2018 all fees for preschool programs delivered in centre-based day care have been derived using data (fees and enrolled hours) supplied by the Australian Government in the CCSS dataset. This was to ensure that all preschool program fees provided were inclusive of government subsidies and that there was consistency between the numerator (fees) and denominator (enrolled hours) for the hourly fees to be derived.

For more information, please see the Appendix 3 - Jurisdictional data quality statements in this, and past, releases. The National Early Childhood Education and Care Collection: Concepts, Sources and Methods publication provides detailed information from the early years of the NECECC, however was no longer updated after the 2013 NECECC.

Centre based day care data

For the 2020 collection, information on preschool programs delivered in CBDC settings was provided by the Australian Government from the Child Care Subsidy System (CCSS), supplemented by jurisdictional CBDC data where provided. All services approved for administering Child Care Subsidy (CCS) must provide data.

Collection date and reference period

The collection date is the first Friday in August each year. The census date for the 2020 collection was Friday 7 August 2020, with the 1 week reference period from 3 August to 9 August 2020. Some jurisdictions use a 2 week reference period that includes the census week. This means the permissible reference period spans 26 July to 15 August 2020 inclusive. Collection dates and reference periods for 2020 are summarised in the table below.

Jurisdiction Collection Dates and Reference Periods
JurisdictionCollection DateReference Period
Australian Government7 August 20203 August - 9 August 2020
New South Wales7 August 20203 August - 14 August 2020(a)
Victoria7 August 202031 July - 7 August 2020
Queensland7 August 20203 August - 9 August 2020
South Australia7 August 20203 August - 14 August 2020(a)
Western Australia7 August 202024 July - 7 August 2020
Tasmania7 August 202027 July - 7 August 2020(a)
Northern Territory7 August 202013 June - 7 August 2020(b)
Australian Capital Territory

7 August 2020

27 July - 7 August 2020(a)(c)

3 August - 14 August 2020(a)(d)

(a) Jurisdiction collected data for a fortnightly reference period to reflect their preschool delivery model.
(b) Reference period for NT did not apply for school holidays between 27 June 2020 – 20 July 2020. In addition, two remote schools operate on different school terms. The reference periods for these schools are 22 June - 31 July and 15 June - 21 August respectively.
(c) Reference period for ACT Catholic preschools.
(d) Reference period for ACT Independent & Government preschools.

Measurement concepts

Jurisdictions collect and report data for the collection using a unit record level (URL) collection methodology. A URL methodology collects information for individual children and service providers. A URL collection is the most appropriate method for ensuring a child who is enrolled in multiple preschool programs is only counted once in child level estimates.

Episodes
For the collection, an episode is a single occurrence of a child enrolled in and/or attending a preschool program. When a child attends two different preschool programs, this is described as a child having two attendance episodes.

Unique child counts
The unique child count ensures that when a child attends two or more different preschool programs, the child is only counted once. In any given collection year, the number of unique children will be expected to be less than their number of preschool episodes.

Year before full-time schooling (YBFS)
The YBFS population takes into account the preschool and school entry provisions of the state in which the child usually resides and the child’s date of birth. As part of deriving this state-specific YBFS population, adjustment factors have been applied to certain cohorts for both New South Wales and Victoria to account for the rates at which children proceed from preschool to school education in those states. The adjustments are based on advice from the state education departments and are:

  • For NSW, children aged between 3 years and 11 months and 4 years and 6 months (at 1 July of collection year) are likely to proceed to school in the following year at a rate of 56%.
  • For Victoria, children aged between 4 years and 2 months and 4 years and 6 months (at 1 July of collection year) are likely to proceed to school the following year at a decreasing rate (month of birth: January 74%, February 63%, March 52%, April 41%).
     

Preschool program fees

Fee schedules can differ between programs, organisations and jurisdictions. Fees may be charged daily, weekly, annually, per session or per term. If data is collected at any level other than weekly, the weekly fee is derived from the collected fee and fee schedule. Fees charged are usually based on the number of hours of a preschool program a child is enrolled to receive. Information on fees is collected at the episode level. Where a child has more than one preschool episode, their fees are calculated by summing the fees for all of their episodes. Data on fees are rounded to the nearest dollar for publication.

Hours

For URL data, information on hours is collected at the episode level. Where a child has more than one episode at a preschool program their hours are calculated by summing the hours for all of their episodes. Data on hours are rounded to the nearest hour for publication. Hours less than 1 but more than 0 are rounded to 1 hour.

Rounding

Hours and fees data have been rounded prior to being assigned to distinct ranges. Where estimates are rounded discrepancies may occur between components items and their totals.

Estimated resident population (ERP)

The preliminary ERP figures presented in this publication are based on the 2016 Census. The ABS has provided these numbers as indicative only. They are included here to support comparative reporting performed using the 2016 ERP time series. In the collection, children enrolled and attending preschool programs in Jervis Bay are included in statistics for the ACT. The Other Territories of Christmas Island and Cocos (Keeling) Islands are included in statistics for WA. Norfolk Island are included in statistics for NSW. Official ERP numbers for WA, ACT and NSW do not include Other Territories.

Estimated resident population(a), single year of age - as at June 2020
NSWVic.QldSAWATas.NTACTAust. (b)
3 yr old98,87280,74063,64119,87635,1035,8743,5365,682313,352
4 yr old103,58086,22966,12721,45836,2426,3383,7065,866329,600
5 yr old101,85584,56666,41720,84635,2766,2393,5025,947324,697
6 yr old102,03683,44467,39221,11334,9426,2563,4765,763324,489
  1. Estimated resident population (ERP) by state/territory and age as published on 17 December 2020 in National, state and territory population. The Census base for ERP is 2016
  2. Australia total includes Other Territories
     

Classifications

Statistics in this publication are presented according to Sector, Statistical Geography and Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA).

Sector

The sector classification used in this publication is a combination of the service provider characteristics Service activity type and Management type, which are part of the ECEC NMDS. Where a child is enrolled in multiple preschool programs, the child’s sector is determined by the characteristics of all the providers at which the child was enrolled.

Tables presented with this classification assign episodes and unique child counts to states and territories according to the geographic location of the service provider.

Statistical geography

For the 2020 collection, data have been classified to the 2016 Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS) standard. The ASGS has been updated based on results from the 2016 Census, including Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA) and remoteness area.

The digital boundaries, codes and labels for each of these regions can be downloaded from the ABS website free of charge.

The remoteness structure within the ASGS divides each state and territory into areas on the basis of their relative access to services. The classes of remoteness area (RA) are:

  • major cities of Australia
  • inner regional Australia
  • outer regional Australia
  • remote Australia
  • very remote Australia
     

For more information please refer to the online publication: Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS): Volume 5 - Remoteness Structure, July 2016.

There are two sets of statistics presented using RAs in this publication. The RA of the child’s main service provider is used, and the RA of the child’s usual residence. Where a child’s usual residence is not stated, their main service provider’s geography is used as a proxy. If the service provider’s geography is also not stated, the child’s RA may be imputed where possible and otherwise included only in the totals. It is possible for states or territories to have a zero count in a certain RA class; Tasmania does not contain a major city, the Northern Territory does not contain a major city or an inner regional classification, and ACT does not contain remote or very remote classifications.

The quantity of records for which RA was derived, using service provider geography, can be identified from the not stated SEIFA IRSD data.

The ASGS local government areas are an ABS approximation of gazetted local government boundaries as defined by each state and territory local government department. The 2020 edition of the local government areas structure has been used in the collection. For more information, see Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS): Volume 3 - Non ABS Structures, June 2020.

The ASGS indigenous structure provides a geographical standard for the publication of statistics about the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population of Australia. The 2016 edition of the indigenous structure has been used in the collection. For more information, see Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS): Volume 2 - Indigenous Structure, July 2016.

The ASGS commonwealth electoral divisions are an ABS approximation of Australian Electoral Commission electoral division boundaries. The 2020 edition of the Commonwealth electoral divisions structure has been used in the collection. For more information, see Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS): Volume 3 - Non ABS Structures, June 2020.

The ASGS state electoral divisions are an ABS approximation of the respective state and territory electoral commission's state electoral districts. The 2020 edition of the State electoral divisions structure has been used in the collection. For more information, see Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS): Volume 3 - Non ABS Structures, June 2020.

Socio-economic indexes for areas

The SEIFA is a product developed especially for those interested in the assessment of the welfare of Australian communities. SEIFA is a suite of four summary measures that have been created from 2016 Census of Population and Housing information. For each index, every geographic area in Australia is given a SEIFA number which shows how disadvantaged that area is compared with other areas in Australia. Quintiles are calculated by ordering the scores for all areas from lowest to highest, with the lowest 20% of areas given a quintile number of 1 and so on, up to the highest 20% of areas which are given a quintile number of 5. The indexes provide more general measures of socio-economic status than is given by measuring, for example, income or unemployment alone. The SEIFA index used for the collection is the Index of Relative Socio-economic Disadvantage (IRSD). Where a child’s geography was not stated, the SEIFA IRSD is published as not stated.

For more information on SEIFA please see the Information Paper: An Introduction to Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA), 2006.

Privacy and confidentiality

Information received by the ABS is treated in strict confidence as required by the Census and Statistics Act 1905 and the Privacy Act 1988. Some figures in this publication have been perturbed in order to prevent the disclosure of information that may allow the identification of individuals or organisations.

General acknowledgement

This publication draws on information provided by the Australian Government, state and territory governments, and the Catholic Education Office of the Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn. Their continued cooperation enables the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) to publish a wide range of education statistics. Information received by the ABS is treated in strict confidence as required by the Census and Statistics Act 1905 .

Additional information

For more information on the collection measurement concepts see the National Early Childhood Education and Care Collection: Concepts, Sources and Methods.

For more information on data collection instructions and guidelines see the National Early Childhood Education and Care Collection: Data Collection Guide (available on request).

Additional statistics are available from Microdata: Preschool Education, Australia using the TableBuilder and/or DataLab facilities.

For more information on estimated resident population and population projections, see National, state and territory population, Regional Population by Age and Sex and Estimates and Projections, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians.

Inquiries

For further information about these and related statistics, contact the National Information and Referral Service on 1300 135 070.

Appendix 1 - Service provider coverage

Table A1 shows the number of service providers from which data were collected for the 2020 collection. All service providers that delivered an early childhood education and care (ECEC) program by a qualified teacher to children between the ages of 3 and 6 years are included in the counts.

A1 Number of early childhood education and care service providers delivering an ECEC program to children aged 3 to 6 years, sector(a)
   NSWVic.Qld(b)SAWATas.NTACTAust.
Preschool         
 Government157232171333667150123821,915
 Non-government         
  Community6358133903----1,841
  Private for profit(c)271-----10
  Independent schools217629131222433291
  Catholic schools1-308133304-206
  Total non-government6598964502425554732,348
 Total preschool8161,128621357922204130854,263
Preschool program within a centre based day care         
 Government21710820641712194461
 Non-government2,9881,6261,634381686116901717,692
 Total centre based day care(d)3,2051,7341,6544457031281091758,153
Total service providers with a preschool program delivered by a qualified teacher4,0212,8622,2758021,62533223926012,416

- nil or rounded to zero (including null cells)
a. State/territory is derived from the provider's location.
b. Queensland data includes a small number of occasional care services providing a preschool program.
c. Includes 'Other'.
d. Some preschools are reclassified to centre based day care due to collection methodologies.
 

The counts were developed by processing service provider information from state and territory submissions and the Australian government’s child care subsidy system (CCSS) submission. Where the same service provider was identified across two data sources, the service provider has been counted only once.

Information from the multiple data sources was compared and service provider data characteristics were updated to make use of the best available data. This methodology resulted in reclassification of service activity type for some service providers in order to most accurately reflect the activity occurring at a service provider. For example, where a service provider was categorised as ‘preschool’ within a state or territory collection but was also categorised as ‘centre based day care with a preschool program’ within the CCSS submission, the service activity type ‘centre based day care with a preschool program' was adopted for that service provider.

Table A2 shows the number of service providers which had enrolments of 4 and 5 year old children. The category 'Total service providers with a preschool program' in this table corresponds to the child statistics reported in this publication.

A2 Number of service providers with an early childhood education program delivered to children aged 4 and 5 years, sector(a)
   NSWVic.(b)Qld(c)SAWATas.NTACTAust.(d)
DELIVERED BY A QUALIFIED EARLY CHILDHOOD TEACHER
Preschool         
 Government155np1713336661467782np
 Non-government         
  Community629np3903----np
  Private for profit(e)2np1-----np
  Independent schools21np28131222433np
  Catholic schools1np308133294-np
  Total non-government653np449242555373np
 Total preschool808np6203579211998485np
Preschool program within a centre based day care         
 Government215np20641512114np
 Non-government2,962np1,62537967211589170np
 Total centre based day care(f)3,177np1,645443687127100174np
Total service providers with a preschool program delivered by a qualified teacher3,985np2,2658001,608326184259np
NOT DELIVERED BY A QUALIFIED EARLY CHILDHOOD TEACHER
Service providers with a preschool program not delivered by a qualified teacher(g)8np1--546-np
TOTAL
Total service providers with a preschool program3,9932,8502,2668001,60833123025912,337

- nil or rounded to zero (including null cells)
np Not available for publication
a. State/territory is derived from the provider's location.
b. Due to the temporary closure of preschool program providers in Victoria, service provider data for that jurisdiction is not published this year.
c. Queensland data includes a small number of occasional care services providing a preschool program.
d. Due to the temporary closure of preschool program providers in Victoria and to prevent incidental disclosure, service provider data for Australia is not published this year.
e. Includes 'Other'.
f. Some preschools are reclassified to centre based day care due to collection methodologies.
g. Includes not stated.

Appendix 2 - Estimates of 3 and 6 year old children in a preschool program

Table A3 contains counts of 3 and 6 year old children who were enrolled in and attended a preschool program in 2020. Since 2016, the collection has included all children enrolled at a CBDC centre for which data was supplied in the CCSS, contributing to increased coverage of 3 and 6 year old children. However for some of the other jurisdictional data sources, the reporting of 3 and 6 year olds enrolled in a preschool program is not mandatory and as a consequence the collection does not have complete coverage.

The 3 and 6 year old preschool data were also influenced by the different service delivery and funding models that exist throughout Australia. For some states and territories, and within some sectors, 3 year old preschool programs are only available for children who meet special preschool program early entry requirements. Enrolments for 6 year olds differ according to primary school starting age (see the Explanatory Notes).

Due to the limitations associated with 3 and 6 year old preschool data, care should be taken when interpreting and using the table below for statistical analysis or comparison to other data. The presented data is incomplete and does not provide an accurate and consistent view of the 3 year old population within or across states and territories. The data is presented with the aim of continuing to improve the coverage in future collections.

A3 Estimates of 3 and 6 year old children in a preschool program(a)(b)
 NSWVic.(c)QldSAWATas.NTACT
CHILDREN AGED 3 YEARS
Attending a preschool program67,903np39,99711,66618,5232,9951,7274,171
Enrolled in a preschool program68,37541,17240,16411,74318,6242,9951,7804,175
CHILDREN AGED 6 YEARS
Attending a preschool program1,156np2,30610976810618173
Enrolled in a preschool program1,1567352,30610976810619173

np Not available for publication
a. Cells in this table have been randomly adjusted to avoid the release of confidential data.
b. Due to the data limitations associated with 3 and 6 year old preschool data, care should be taken when interpreting and using the table for statistical analysis or comparison.
c. Due to the temporary closure of preschool program providers in Victoria, attendance data for that jurisdiction is not published this year.

Appendix 3 - Jurisdictional data quality statements

The 2020 National Early Childhood Education and Care Collection (NECECC) brings together data submitted by many stakeholders. The 2020 NECECC was conducted to support performance based reporting for the National Partnership Agreement on Universal Access to Early Childhood Education – 2018–2021. To do this, it aims to compile child and service provider statistics from all service providers delivering an in-scope preschool program within Australia.

The NECECC uses data standards to ensure the quality and consistency of data submitted (hereafter referred to as NECECC standards). The 2020 Early Childhood Education and Care National Minimum Data Set (2020 ECEC NMDS), sets the 2020 NECECC standards, and can be accessed via the AIHW METeOR website. The 2020 NECECC standards were updated with clarifying wording to support interpretation regarding potential impacts of COVID-19.

The jurisdictional data quality statements allow for quality and consistency assessment across the data submissions that contribute to the NECECC. The statements have been informed by the ABS Data Quality Framework and have been developed, in consultation with the ABS, by the stakeholders responsible for submitting data for the NECECC. Any deviations from the NECECC standards are detailed accordingly.

The jurisdictional data quality statements also inform the overarching Data Quality Declaration for the publication, Preschool Education, Australia.

Jurisdictional data quality statements have been provided by the following organisations:

  • Australian Government - Department of Education, Skills and Employment (Australian Government DESE)
  • New South Wales - Department of Education (NSW DoE)
  • Victoria - Department of Education and Training (Vic. DET)
  • Queensland - Department of Education (Qld DoE)
  • South Australia - Department for Education (SA Department)
  • Western Australia - Department of Education (WA DoE)
  • Tasmania - Department of Education (Tas. DoE)
  • Northern Territory - Department of Education (NT DoE)
  • ACT - Education Directorate (the Directorate)
  • ACT - Catholic Education


To enhance readability across the data quality statements, the term ‘preschool’ has been used in place of where some jurisdictions may otherwise use the term ‘kindergarten’ or ‘early childhood education program’ (see the glossary for more information).

Australian Government

In 2020 the Australian Government Department of Education, Skills and Employment (DESE) submission to the NECECC consisted of child care administrative data.

Child Care administrative data is information, collected in the Child Care Subsidy System (CCSS), on child care services and the children and families that use Australian Government approved child care. The CCSS is the Australian Government's primary mechanism for managing child care payments. Child Care administrative data contains payment and related data on centre based day care (which includes the former long Day Care type care) services related to the delivery of early childhood education programs (ECEP) - also referred to as 'preschool' or 'kindergarten'.

Child care administrative data

Institutional environment

While DESE has portfolio responsibility for child care, responsibility for the operation of the child care administrative data is shared with the Australian Government Department of Services Australia.

Child care administrative data is collected for the purposes of administering Child Care Subsidy (which replaced the Child Care Benefit (CCB) and Child Care Rebate (CCR)) payments) under A New Tax System (Family Assistance) (Administration) Act 1999 (Cwlth), A New Tax System (Family Assistance) Act 1999 (Cth) and Family Assistance Legislation (Jobs for Families Child Care Package) Act 2017. Payments are administered by Services Australia.

Relevance

The CCSS is the national system that enables child care services to exchange child care information online with the Australian Government to enable the payment of Child Care Subsidy, on behalf of parents, to approved child care services. It also provides information about the national supply and usage of child care. All approved child care services must use the CCSS, but for the purposes of this Data Quality Statement, reference will be confined to centre based day care services required to meet the National Quality Framework (NQF).

Centre based day care services must regularly submit data to the CCSS, through software developed by registered third-party software providers, or directly via a web portal, and record child demographic, enrolment and attendance information.

Scope: In 2020, the scope of the child care administrative data extracted for the NECECC included:

  • all children aged 3 to 6 years from all approved centre based day care providers that operate in accordance with the NQF;
  • the primary source of hours data (enrolled and attended) was drawn from centre based day care providers standard data, in some cases jurisdiction data was used for hours (enrolled and attended) where it is available.

Coverage: All approved centre based day care providers are required to provide data related to the administration of Child Care Subsidy (such as enrolments and attendances) through the Child Care Subsidy System. Centre based day care providers approved for Child Care Subsidy but which do not operate in accordance with the NQF (such as former Occasional Care Services and Budget Based Funding services) and services not approved for Child Care Subsidy (such as state-run preschools) have been excluded, where possible, from child care administrative data.

Data collection methods: The 2020 child care administrative data used a unit record level (URL) collection methodology for children and services and is drawn from the Services Australia Enterprise Data Warehouse.

Timeliness

The first data extract from the CCSS was provided to the ABS in 2018. The 2020 child care administrative data for the reference week Monday 3 – Sunday 9 August 2020 was extracted in October 2020. The Australian Government DESE processed and validated the data before submitting it to the ABS on 18 January 2021.

Accuracy

Centre based day care services are required by A New Tax System (Family Assistance) Act 1999 (Cth) and Family Assistance Legislation (Jobs for Families Child Care Package) Act 2017 legislation, to submit certain records (weekly enrolments and attendance records etc.), for all children in attendance at the service. Record details, such as child dates of birth and reference numbers as well as service client IDs, are checked and cross-referenced. This ensures there can only be one current enrolment at a service for the same parent/guardian and child combination.

This results in:

  • high accuracy for child demographic details such as name, date of birth and address information etc. and the child's associated attendance records
  • high accuracy for children's ECEP attendance as it is assumed that all children attending a quality centre based day care service are receiving an Early Childhood Education Program.
     

Data on Indigenous status is captured within the Services Australia data warehouse.  Within the Services Australia data collections, families may identify as Indigenous or choose not to provide this information. Those families who choose not to identify are classified as ‘non-Indigenous’ rather than ‘unknown/not stated’ for the publication as per previous years.

The Indigenous status indicator used in the 2020 NECECC data has been revised. This was after inconsistencies in the Indigenous data were identified. The inconsistencies, particularly regarding how children and families are identified as being Indigenous, have now been addressed.

Coherence

The collection of child URL data ensures duplications are minimised and the total child count is as robust as systematically possible. Deviations between the NECECC standards and child care administrative data collected are outlined in the table below:

Deviation from the NECECC standards
Data ElementDetails of Deviation
Preschool program fees chargedData on preschool fees are not collected separately, and centre based day care services fees are used as a proxy.
Preschool program received from a qualified teacherThe CCSS does not record which staff member delivered ECEP or where centre based day care services may have waivers in place. It is assumed that all centre based day care services are delivering ECEP in accordance with requirements contained within the National Quality Framework.
Service operating weeksIn some cases the service operating weeks was not stated. It is a legal requirement that centre based day care services must operate for at least 48 weeks per year, so not stated was imputed to be 48 weeks.
Hours attended and offeredThe Child Care Subsidy was introduced on 2 July 2018, and it was not mandatory for services to start reporting hours attended until the fortnight ending 14 January 2019. However, as attended hours is relatively new data, hours enrolled has been used as a proxy for attended and offered hours.

Accessibility

Privacy and confidentiality requirements within family assistance law limit the publication of Child Care administrative data at certain granularities. De-identified aggregate data (which includes Child Care administrative data) are published as part of Preschool Education, Australia and Microdata: Preschool Education, Australia on the ABS website. A selection of Child Care administrative data is published quarterly and is available on the Australian Government DESE website www.education.gov.au.

Information source

The information in this report has been sourced from the Australian Government DESE in consultation with the ABS. Further information is available from the Australian Government DESE website www.education.gov.au.

New South Wales

Victoria

Queensland

South Australia

Western Australia

Tasmania

Northern Territory

Australian Capital Territory

Appendix 4 - State-specific year before full time schooling

Background

In 2016, a new state-specific year before full time schooling (YBFS) definition was developed to better reflect the YBFS concept needed for national reports by government. This state-specific YBFS definition uses the preschool and school age entry provisions of the state or territory in which the child usually resides. This improves on previous definitions by accounting for the differences across Australia in the age at which children are to be enrolled in school.

The state-specific YBFS definition has been created mainly to assist with the Report on Government Services (RoGS) and National Indigenous Reform Agreement (NIRA). The new definition does not change the performance indicators for the current National Partnership Agreement on Universal Access to Early Childhood Education – 2018-2021.

Statistics for the state-specific YBFS definition have been included in Preschool Education, Australia since 2016 and replace the original YBFS definition based statistics published in prior years. The original YBFS definition included all children enrolled and attending a preschool program aged 4 years and only children aged 5 years who had not previously attended a preschool program as a 4 year old.

Calculating state-specific YBFS cohorts

Table A4 shows the state-specific age ranges for children in their year before commencing school. For six jurisdictions, children born over a specified interval of 12 months are included. However, for New South Wales and Victoria the interval is slightly broader with adjustment factors applied to account for the rates at which the youngest children in the interval proceed from preschool to school education in those states.

A4 State-specific YBFS age cohorts based on months and years of birth
State or TerritoryAge cohorts by month and year of birth
NSWAll children born 2 July 2014 - 31 December 2015 and adjusted counts for children born in the interval 1 January 2016 - 31 July 2016 (56%)
VicAll children born 2 July 2014 - 31 December 2015 and adjusted counts for children born in January 2016 (74%), February 2016 (63%), March 2016 (52%), April 2016 (41%)
Qld, WA, NTAll children born 1 July 2015 – 30 June 2016
SA and ACTAll children born 1 May 2015 – 30 April 2016
TasAll children born 1 January 2015 – 31 December 2015

The preschool education statistics for the state-specific YBFS cohorts can be found in Tables 28 to 31 of the datacube in Preschool Education, Australia, 2020. These statistics are presented by the child’s state or territory of usual residence, which aligns with the place of usual residence basis for ABS population estimates and projections.

Population estimates for state-specific YBFS cohorts

Population estimates for the state-specific YBFS cohorts were created to allow reporting of population proportions within RoGS and NIRA with greater accuracy than would otherwise be possible.

The state-specific YBFS population estimates in Table A5 for all children were created by:

  • Distributing each state/territory’s estimated resident population (ERP) for children aged 3 to 6 years across individual months of birth according to birth statistics for the same time interval. The data used in these calculations were sourced from National, state and territory population and Births, Australia.

  • The distributed ERP was then aggregated according to the state-specific YBFS cohort age ranges in each state/territory. The same adjustment factors were applied for NSW and Victoria as highlighted in Table A4.
  • Finally, a deduction was made for the number of children aged 4 and 5 years of age in the state-specific YBFS cohorts that were attending school in each state/territory. This deduction was based on counts reported in Schools, Australia.


For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, the same process was used but with population projections from Estimates and Projections, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians instead of ERP. This is because ERP for 30 June 2020 by single year of age are not currently available for this population.

A5 Population estimates in state-specific YBFS cohorts
 NSWVic.QldSAWATas.NTACT
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders6,8071,3665,3559982,2795881,375156
Non-indigenous(a)106,08987,90860,35719,67333,8285,5582,3165,746
Total112,89589,27465,71220,67136,1076,1463,6915,902

a. Calculated as the total less Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children

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