Children's Minister, Margaret Hodge visited the nursery that all four of her children attended this week (Monday 10 January) as the council's early years service continued to go from strength to strength. Kate Greenaway is Islington Council's first full neighbourhood nursery for children aged 6 months to 5 years. By September 2005 it will become a Children's Centre working with Sure Start Copenhagen to offer stay and play groups for local families with young children, health advice, parenting support, and adult learning. Children's Minister, Margaret Hodge said: "I was delighted to be invited back to Kate Greenaway nursery. I congratulate the nursery for making such a rapid transition from a traditional nursery school to a Neighbourhood Nursery that is now well on it's way to becoming a Children's Centre. The potential for improving the quality of life for children in the area is enormous and very exciting as every child deserves the best start in life and the opportunity to achieve their potential." Under the Neighbourhood Nursery Initiative a new extension has been built to provide specialist facilities for under 3's including a playroom with full access to the garden, a sleep room, a laundry room, a small kitchen and a parents' room. The building cost £400k and plans are already underway to develop the nursery garden with £45,000 of funding from P&O (Regent's Quarter Development). "We want to give children the best possible start as what happens in those first few years impacts on the rest of their life. Islington has some of the most deprived areas and good early years provision is important if we are to help families. At Kate Greenaway, the boroughs first neighbourhood nursery, we can reach and support more families by giving them information and services like 'drop ins', help with childcare tax credit and access to health services. "The council's early years service offers high quality provision and is recognised as one of the best in the country. With seven children's centres already offering a range of help, advice and education to young children and their families and more to come I'm confident our early years provision will continue to go from strength to strength," says Councillor James Kempton, executive member for children. Head, Julian Greniar added: "The staff have worked tremendously hard to transform Kate Greenaway into a nursery school that will more fully meet the needs of our local community. New parents have been telling us how happy they are with the new nursery and more importantly how happy their children are. We have received tremendous support from the governing body and from Islington Council, and are very proud of what we have achieved together." The nursery is now open from 8am to 6pm 48 weeks a year and currently offers 51 places. There are three types of place - free nursery education, free places for children referred by the Children in Need Panel, and extended hours places for working and studying parents. Fees are subsidised by Islington Council and the Neighbourhood Nursery Initiative to make places affordable for local people in work - with Working Tax Credit this means fees start from around £30 a week. The nursery is expanding the number of places - to put children down for a place, call 020 7837 4982 or email Julian.grenier@islington.gov.uk Come into the nursery at York Way Court, Copenhagen Street, N1 0UH. Or log onto www.kategreenaway.ik.org Islington's Margaret McMillan and North Islington Nursery school have also been listed on Ofsted's new Internet list of England's most successful schools, recognising the high quality of services provided. In its Local Authority Early Years Profile September 2004 analysis from Ofsted shows that full-time Islington nursery education continues to be one of the best in the country. These reports compare the inspection outcomes of 17 full-time Islington nurseries from the private, voluntary and maintained sectors (not schools), inspected between April 2003 and June 2004 with national results. There are four gradings: very good, good, significant weaknesses and unacceptable. An overall mark on the quality of the nursery and a rating for each of the six areas of learning and quality of teaching, partnership with parents, leadership and management and improvements since the last inspection. 41.2% of the Islington settings inspected are rated as very good overall compared with only 31.8% nationally. On every scale Islington had a higher percentage of settings on the very good scale than settings nationally. 88.2% of Islington settings were rated as very good for physical development. The remaining 11.8% were rated as good. (This compares with national figures of 52.5% and 42.5%) 88.2% of the settings inspected were rated as Very Good and the remaining 11.8% rated as Good for their partnership with parents (compared with 56.6% and 40.3% nationally). Ends
Page Last Updated: 29 July 2008