These scholarships provide opportunities for educators to upgrade their skills, increase the number of professionally qualified teachers and improve the quality of early childhood services available.

All early childhood teachers working in approved centre based services now need to be accredited by the NSW Education Standards Authority.

NSW centre based services with 30 or more preschool aged children also must have at least one accredited early childhood teacher in attendance to comply with the National Quality Framework and National Quality standards.

Scholarships and grants

Scholarship programs are open and available for application during set periods including:

• Aboriginal early childhood education scholarships: open to Aboriginal people, who may not yet be working in early childhood education, but wish to enrol in an approved early childhood teaching degree course
• Rural and remote early childhood teaching scholarships: for educators who have not yet started a degree level course
• Incentive scholarships: for educators already studying at degree level at university
• Professional Development Grants: available to providers of community and mobile preschools to increase skills and capacity of staff