NCMA to change name and broaden membership
Gabriella Jozwiak
Monday, November 12, 2012
The National Childminding Association (NCMA) is to admit members from professions beyond childminding from spring next year, the organisation has announced.
The NCMA will also change its name to the Professional Association for Childcare and Early Years from January in anticipation of the change.
NCMA said its decision to represent more individual early years workers and adopt the new title followed consultation with more than 1,500 existing members, who wanted to raise the status of childminding as a profession.
It also spoke to unaffiliated nannies, nursery workers and pre-school providers to determine whether they would like to be represented by the body.
In a joint statement, co-chief executives Liz Bayram and Catherine Farrell at NCMA said the changes marked “another significant step on our journey to become a standard-setting professional association for the sector”.
“Our name change is part of a wider rebranding process to ensure we better recognise all the different professionals in our membership – childminders, nannies and, from the spring, nursery and pre-school workers,” said Bayram and Farrell.
“It will help us to increase recognition of their professionalism too – something we know is as important to our childminder and nanny members as it is to nursery and pre-school workers.”
NCMA said increasing its membership would enable the organisation to provide a stronger collective voice, and that it planned to offer new members the same services including insurance, legal advice and guidance.
NCMA began as a membership organisation for childminders in 1977 and began admitting nannies to the body from 2004.
