Transcript Reasons why early childhood professionals need a code of ethics

The Ethics of Leadership
By Jillian Rodd
ANGIE 69080043
08 May 2010
Early Childhood Leader:
• Is involved and influential in the lives and
welfare of children and families
• Consider the impact of decision
• Politically aware and to act as advocates
for children and families – act as a voice
for those who are vulnerable and
powerless
I. Promoting and Protecting
Children’s Rights
• Young children are dependent, vulnerable,
and voiceless in society.
• Children have a universal right to survival
and development.
• Development: physical health, also
mental, emotional, cognitive, social, and
cultural development. The principle of
equality is inherent.
I. Promoting and Protecting
Children’s Rights
• Acting as a protector, advocate, facilitator, and
negotiator becomes a high priority because their
intimate knowledge about individuals and
extensive experience with young children place
early childhood leaders in the best position to
know what is in the best interest of the child and
their family.
• Children need special support to allow them
access to their rights. Adults working with
children need to be aware of, sensitive to and
respectful of their rights and best interests and
take on an enabling role.
I. Promoting and Protecting
Children’s Rights
• Every educator… must come to realize
that they… have a responsibility to work
for children’s rights and that they can do
much on a day to day basis to support,
extend and uphold children’s rights.
II. Providing Quality and
Economically Viable Services
• The push towards becoming
entrepreneurial and being responsive to
the demands of a competitive market
means that consideration of children’s
rights may be pushed into the background
when developing new and existing
services.
II. Providing Quality and
Economically Viable Services
• While it is essential that early childhood services
be affordable and cost efficient, these factors
must be balanced against the ethical
responsibility to protect children’s rights.
Ultimately, early childhood services cannot
afford to sacrifice children’s rights in order to
meet short term priorities and pressures
because this may in fact have long term effects
on children’s development as productive
citizens.
II. Providing Quality and
Economically Viable Services
• Quality is not a finite goal which once attained
can be checked off a list of things to do. Quality
is a complex ideal which early childhood
professionals continually pursue. Our
understanding of quality will change over time as
our understanding of young children’s
development, needs and rights grows.
• Quality in early childhood is related to high
quality professional practice where the rights
and interests of the child are regarded as the
highest priority.
Five central goals and values:
1. Children come first. Every child has a
right to depend upon adults to provide
the conditions which will enable them to
reach their full potential.
We all bear responsibility for all our
children and it is essential that parents
and carers should receive the necessary
support to ensure that their children
receive the best possible start in life.
Five central goals and values:
2. Children have a right to be recognised as
people with views and interests. They
have the right to be listened to and to
participate in decision making about
issues which affect their lives.
Five central goals and values:
3. Children should have the opportunity to
be part of a family and community, to
experience a stable learning and caring
environment which enhances their
esteem as individuals, their dignity and
autonomy, self confidence and
enthusiasm for learning, and respect for
others which ensures they are free from
discrimination.
Five central goals and values:
4. Parents, carers and communities need to be
supported in promoting the interests and
welfare of their children. Children need strong
adults upon whom they can depend to provide
love, security and the financial resources to
ensure they can access an adequate standard
of living.
Early years services must be rooted in local
community infrastructures and provide real
choice for families, particularly those on low
incomes.
Five central goals and values:
5. Children have the right to safe play
environments which provide a whole
range of opportunities for autonomy,
social development and recreational
activity.
Children and families also have the right
to participate in the services provided by
the retail, cultural and tourist sectors.
The services provided for children should
start with and be based upon the rights
and interests of the child, not from the
interests of parents (although the common
interests of parents and children must be
recognised), nor from those of
professionals, the organisation, finances,
and educational fads.
III. Administering Early Childhood
Centres in Accordance with the
Profession’s Ethical Principles
1.
2.
3.
4.
Effective administration or management
of early childhood centres involves four
major functions:
Planning
Implementation
Operation
Evaluation
III. Administering Early Childhood
Centres in Accordance with the
Profession’s Ethical Principles
1. Planning:
• Aspects of leadership
• Philosophy
• Involvement of others
III. Administering Early Childhood
Centres in Accordance with the
Profession’s Ethical Principles
2.
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Implementation:
Ethical decision making
Creative problem solving
Aspects of motivation
Team building
Staff development
III. Administering Early Childhood
Centres in Accordance with the
Profession’s Ethical Principles
3. Operation:
• Knowledge base for the running of early
childhood services
• Choices made in relation to issues such
as facilities, equipment, the use of space,
room arrangement and scheduling
• Financial management
• Record keeping
III. Administering Early Childhood
Centres in Accordance with the
Profession’s Ethical Principles
4. Evaluation:
• Ongoing learning process which provides
information about the effectiveness of early
childhood services
• Informs the management of change
Each of these four functions can involve ethical
issues and dilemmas, that is, moral decision
making that cannot be settled by reference to
educational or developmental theory and
research.
III. Administering Early Childhood
Centres in Accordance with the
Profession’s Ethical Principles
Staff selection, development and evaluation are
areas which are central to the ethical
administration of an early childhood centre.
The better the understanding that early childhood
professionals and support staff have about what
constitutes quality in early childhood services,
the goals of early care and education and child
development… the more responsive early
childhood services can be to children and
families.
III. Administering Early Childhood
Centres in Accordance with the
Profession’s Ethical Principles
Evaluation of staff, practice and services
must be conducted within the context of
social responsibility, children’s rights and
ethical decision making.
IV. Employing an Early Childhood Code
of Ethics to Guide the Resolution of
Ethical Dilemmas
Reasons why early childhood professionals need a
code of ethics:
1.
They have considerable autonomy and
independence over their behavior and decisions.
Decisions have to be made quickly, often without
discussion with or reference to others. Such
pressures may result in unsuitable behavior or
decisions which do not protest children’s rights or
are not in their best interest.
A decision which can be rationalised and justified
by reference to a code of ethics appears to carry
more weight and credibility and as such is less
likely to be challenged than one which does not
have such a solid underpinning.
IV. Employing an Early Childhood Code
of Ethics to Guide the Resolution of
Ethical Dilemmas
Reasons why early childhood professionals need a
code of ethics:
2. Many situations and incidents which occur in
day to day work with young children contain
inherent conflict of value or interest or pose an
ethical dilemma.
Ethical dilemmas are situations which involve
conflict between core values and difficult, even
painful choices that result in less than
satisfactory outcomes.
IV. Employing an Early Childhood Code
of Ethics to Guide the Resolution of
Ethical Dilemmas
Reasons why early childhood professionals need a
code of ethics:
3. The infrastructures of the early childhood
profession contains a number of features (low
status and power, multiplicity of clients with
potentially conflicting needs and interests, role
ambiguity and poor integration of knowledge
base and practice) which increase the
likelihood of ethical dilemmas occurring in day
to day practice.
IV. Employing an Early Childhood Code
of Ethics to Guide the Resolution of
Ethical Dilemmas
• One of the limitations of many professional
codes of ethics is that they have no power to
enforce the code or apply sanctions to members
who choose not to endorse or comply with the
principles and values accepted by and for the
professional group as a whole.
• Behaving in accordance with a profession’s code
of ethics tends to be a voluntary undertaking by
individual members of that profession.
IV. Employing an Early Childhood Code
of Ethics to Guide the Resolution of
Ethical Dilemmas
Moral orientation has two dimensions:
• A justice rights orientation: emphasises
objectivity and universality and directs the leader
to treat others fairly and avoid interfering with
their rights. Men act more generally on this one.
• A care connectedness orientation: uses
attachment and care, expressed as concern with
providing for the needs of others, as guiding
principles in moral decisions. Women are more
frequently guided by this one.
• It is important to appreciate both dimensions in
making decisions.
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