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What we're doing to support the workforce

The Victorian Government is investing almost $370 million to attract and upskill early childhood teachers and educators.

Thousands of aspiring early childhood teachers and educators will help to deliver Victoria’s $14 billion Best Start Best Life reforms – including Three-Year-Old Kindergarten and Pre-Prep over the coming years.

To support the workforce, the Victorian Government has expanded the suite of scholarships, incentives, educator traineeships and career advancement programs and supports.

We’re investing almost $370 million to attract high-quality early childhood teachers and educators to the sector and support and upskill existing professionals, to help children get the best start in life.

The funding includes:

  • upskilling 780 diploma-qualified educators to become degree-qualified teachers
  • delivering better placement and mentoring experiences for 550 students
  • enabling up to 200 trainees to undertake a paid traineeship in an early childhood service while completing a relevant Certificate III qualification.

Immediate support is already available to help early childhood services recruit qualified teachers and educators. This includes:

  • financial incentives of up to $50,000 to encourage professionals to move to hard-to-staff locations
  • targeted recruitment agency support to attract quality candidates
  • incentives of $9,000 to join or re-join the Victorian early childhood workforce for eligible professionals.

To support workforce development and retention, early childhood professionals have access to a range of free career development opportunities. These include:

  • conferences for first-year teachers
  • communities of practice for second- and third-year teachers
  • coaching and mentoring support for provisionally registered teachers and experienced teachers and educators returning to the sector
  • Early Years Learning Networks for teachers in leadership roles to share professional expertise.

Experienced teachers and educators can also develop their coaching and mentoring skills through a new professional learning program.

Learn more

Find out more and sign up for these and other training and development opportunities for early childhood professionals.

Find training and support

Reviewed 16 August 2023

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