SDN Riverwood Children’s Education and Care Centre (SDN) has been awarded the Excellent rating

Date Awarded: 15 October 2021

Valid until: 14 October 2024

SDN Riverwood Children’s Education and Care Centre (SDN) has been awarded the Excellent rating by the Australian Children’s Education and Care Quality Authority (ACECQA), the highest rating a service can achieve under the National Quality Framework.

The Sydney based service was recognised for its:

• inclusive partnerships with children and families
• positive workplace culture and organisational values, sustained commitment to professional development and support of educators
• practice and environments that enhance children’s learning and growth.

Examples of exceptional practice at the service include:

• Service staff are mindful of creating a safe and secure learning environment for children and families experiencing disadvantage or vulnerabilities. The service empowers families to build support systems through a buddy system initiative that partners similar families together. The aim of this initiative is for all families to have a sense of belonging and to be enriched by their buddy family’s contributions. An SDNR outdoor bench is provided as a space for families to build these partnerships. The nominated supervisor also checks in with families to ensure they find the buddy partnership beneficial.
• The service has partnered with a local community organisation that helps to feed, clothe and support residents facing hardship or disadvantage. The service provides meals and fresh fruit for their community every week.
• The team focused on defining, designing, and maintaining practices to sustain a positive team culture at the service, through sessions identifying:
  • foundational concepts of a positive team culture, including acknowledging uniqueness amongst colleagues
  • positive team culture behaviours, such as inclusion and flexibility
  • possible outcomes of a positive team culture, including respect, growth, trust and continuity of staff.
• Families voiced their concerns about road safety around the service premises. Families, children and the service decided that the whole service community needed to advocate for a road crossing and parking bay outside the service. The children learnt about road safety through group discussions and creative art learning experiences and were given the opportunity to create petitions to the service’s local council. Their requests were approved and a road crossing and parking bay have been built, and a road crossing was constructed, allowing safe crossing and access to the local park. Shortly after, staff, children and families created and submitted another petition that was then approved by the local council to build a parking bay outside of the service.

As a leader in the sector, SDN Riverwood Children’s Education and Care Centre is committed to sharing its practices with the wider education and care sector, helping to ensure its positive impact reaches beyond the children and families who access the service.

About the Excellent rating

Services that receive ‘Exceeding National Quality Standard’ in all seven quality areas can apply to ACECQA for the Excellent rating. The Excellent rating is awarded for three years. After this time services have the option to re-apply.