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This paper proposes a scheme to estimate the technical efficiency at child care centers for the less‐than‐three‐year‐old infants by Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and to manage the quality of care service through implementing flexible and efficient government subsidy system. The result of technical efficiency estimation shows that there exists the heterogeneity in technical efficiency a substantial opportunity for improvement in technical efficiency across child care centers. This result implies that government may bring up the competition by giving subsidy differentially based on efficiency and use the money which has been used inefficiently other purposes. Both can improve the quality of child care service.

This article reflects on the significance of family centres in the UK as a mirror of new possibilities for child welfare in the years following the Children Act 1989. The Act empowered local authorities in England and Wales to provide family centres as part of ‘family support practice’. The article reveals a rich vein of family‐centred, centre‐based activity internationally and shows practice combining intervention from the sophisticated to the very informal. The authors focus on so‐called ‘integrated centres’ as complex systems of care with wide implications for practice and outcome evaluation in an ‘evidence‐based’ context.

Childcare is an essential part of early life environment that has a significant influence on lifelong physical and mental health. This study aimed to examine the relationship between development, growth and frequency of illness in different types of care.

This cross-sectional study recruited 177 children aged 30–36 months and their caregivers. Of these 66 were being cared for at home and 111 were attending out-of-home day-care facilities. An interview form, growth measurement and the Denver Developmental Screening Test II were collected. The association between child developmental, growth and illness variables was analyzed with Chi-square, Fisher's exact and Mann–Whitney U tests.

This study found that the development and growth results did not show statistically significant differences between the home-care and day-care groups. The number of minor illnesses was significantly lower in home-care children than in day-care children (OR = 0.33, 95% CI = 0.15-0.72).

This study indicated that the risk of infection is increased in the children attending day care. Provision of a healthy and safe childcare environment needs to be an essential health promotion strategy to improve family and child well-being.

As the number of women's participation in the labor market has increased rapidly over the past decades, so did the number of children in nonparental care. The study findings reflect that the development of a day-care center for children was unclear, whereas the risk of infection was increased. Therefore, provision of a healthy and safe childcare environment needs to be an essential health promotion strategy to improve family and child well-being.

In Australia, the child care industry has experienced substantial growth since 1991 resulting in a proliferation of child care centres throughout the country, to the point where supply of child care places is now in excess of demand. As a result, child care marketers now compete within a turbulent environment where it is vital to satisfy and retain customers in order to survive. Seeks to increase our knowledge of child care services consumption behaviour, and assist the child care marketer to understand their consumers and the difficulties they face as they interact with a service that they do not experience first hand. A self‐administered survey instrument was developed and administered to a sample of child care service switchers. The results indicate significant findings within, and between choice, switching, and post‐switching dimensions. The exploration of decision‐making areas provides a number of practical implications not only for the child care marketer, but also for government policy makers, child care consumers, and service providers in general.

The present range and character of child‐care services in Britain have evolved erratically over a long period of time. Structured by a succession of Acts of Parliament, shaped and re‐shaped by the changing pattern of social values, needs and expectations, current provision is both complex and comprehensive. Statutory and voluntary bodies now provide preventive services, shelter and treatment for both the deprived and the delinquent, for the able‐bodied and the handicapped, for infants and for adolescents. Often this care will be provided in the child's own home or in a foster home, but at any one time roughly 40 per cent of the 120,000 children and young persons that are today the responsibility of local authorities will be resident in a children's home.

Developing countries like India, accounts for about 40 percent of undernourished children in the World and it is largely due to the result of dietary inadequacy in relation to their needs. The purpose of this paper was to evaluate the changes in the nutritional status of the children, from their preschool days to the present primary school days.

The present investigation was conducted at 20 Integrated Child Development Service (ICDS) centers (Center-A) and 15 primary schools (Center-B) in Bali Gram Panchayat, Arambag, Hooghly District of West Bengal, India, at an interval of three to four years. A total of 1,012 children (boys=498; girls=514) aged two to six years old enrolled in these ICDS centers and a total of 603 children (boys=300, girls=303), aged five to ten years were studied from the 15 primary schools who were the beneficiaries of ICDS centers. Underweight (weight-for-age Z-score (WAZ)) and wasting (weight-for height Z-score (WHZ)) were used to assess the nutritional status.

The nutritional situation (both in case of underweight and wasting) was better in Center B as compared with Center A. In general, the nutritional condition of boys was better than girls. Center had a very significant effect on both WAZ as well as WHZ, irrespective of age and sex. Sex has a significant impact only on WAZ. Interestingly, there was no significant sex-center interaction for both WAZ as well as WHZ. The children of the area were getting Mid Day Meal supplied through the school authorities which was comparatively better than the ICDS centers’ food supplementation. Better monitoring of nutritional supplementation at primary schools may be an important factor.

In ICDS centers, only the Anganwari worker is responsible in running and implementing the programs offered by the Government. However, at primary schools, the active involvement of all the teachers to run the program may have effectively led to have better results. Furthermore, the Government's focus should not be only on the increase the area covered by the ICDS program, but focus should be to increase the quality of food supplied, proper monitoring of the implementation and increase the allocation of funds. Appropriate measures may be taken by the authorities regarding this.

The results of the study will help in policy making in reducing the prevalence of undernutrition.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how government policy has encouraged universities and their community group partnerships to work together through the relationship between the University of Brighton and members of community groups in Hastings who are researching recent educational regeneration in the town. It identifies lessons learnt from engaging community members with such research.

The University of Brighton in Hastings was set up to be a catalyst for change in one of the most deprived coastal towns in the country. The Coastal Regeneration Research Centre (CRRC) was created in 2008 to undertake a research‐led programme within, and focused upon, the community and has established a track record of research and engagement in this community. Research projects have been supported by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), East Sussex County Council (ESCC) and Hastings Borough Council (HBC) and the Ore Valley Forum.

The relationship between the University and its partners is exemplified through an example of a pilot project examining use of a children's centre in Hastings. This research draws upon work by Turning Point, a charity engaged primarily with social care which engages users within the community to become involved in research into the needs of their peers. Turning Point's successful approach was subsequently adopted in the pilot project examining how parents of pre‐school children engage with a children's community centre in a deprived area of Hastings. The pilot project involved two experienced parent researchers supporting six parent volunteers in their interviews with local parents of young children who engage to varying degrees with the local children's centre.

This paper examines how government policy has encouraged universities and their community group partnerships to work together to research recent educational regeneration in Hastings. It identifies lessons learnt from engaging community members with such research.

The purpose of this paper is to describe a collaboration between independent researchers and an English local authority to develop a framework for understanding and measuring outcomes in children centres.

The project was based on developing a system for collecting quantitative and qualitative data that would reflect the multi-dimensional services delivered by children centres. This was called the Early Intervention Performance Outcomes Framework. It utilised the concept of interim outcomes and in so doing the aim was to create a system that would provide evidence for the difference these services could make to children and their families’ lives. It was also important for the system to enhance and not detract from service capacity in a period of austerity.

The paper reports on the project when it had generated its first year of data. The paper describes the overall success of the project, the on-going challenges it faces and provides some examples of how interim outcomes represented “steps along the way” for children and families.

The innovative collaboration described in this paper provides a positive example of how research methods can enhance both service design and delivery. It will be of interest to both those who work and manage children’s services and those engaged in research.

A case study is reported of a relationship-based early intervention (EI) service for children with complex needs in New Zealand. The purpose of this paper is to explore parent and professional views and perceptions about the key characteristics of a relationship-based EI service.

This qualitative study involved interviews and observations with 39 participants (10 children, 11 parents and 18 professionals).

Parents appreciated the knowledgeable, well-trained professionals who invested time in getting to know (and love) children and families and family practices, worked together in harmony and valued the contribution that parents made to their child’s progress and achievement. Professionals described the key characteristics of the service in terms of the range of therapies offered by the service, the focus on a strengths-based and family-focussed approach, play-based assessments, acceptance and value of family practices (including responsiveness to Maori and bi-culturalism), appropriate and respectful places to meet and greet families and work with children, and recruitment and retention of humble professionals who identified with the ethos of the model. Observable social processes and structures within the delivery of the model include respectful professional interactions and relationships with children and families, integrated professional working, effective and timely communication between professionals and families, pedagogy of listening, waiting and personalisation, engaged families and actively participating children.

This case study emphasises the significance of professional love and relational pedagogy to EI services and the value of this to improving parent-child relationships and children’s long-term outcomes.

This paper aims to study parental expectations of and satisfaction with overall services of preschool centres and to determine the factors which affect parents’ satisfaction in a part of one of Thailand’s southern provinces.

Data were collected using a structured questionnaire from parents of children attending 29 day-care or preschool centres in Songkhla Province, South Thailand, over a two-month period in the Spring 2014. The data were analysed mainly using descriptive statistics and some correlation analyses with subsequent logical interpretation.

Given the location and non-compulsory nature of the childcare provision being assessed, it would seem fair to say that the answer to the overarching objective was fairly positive. Expectations were non-trivial; parents looked for more than “baby-minding” and expected there to be some appropriately qualified staff. The perceived satisfaction levels indicate that there is nevertheless scope for improvement.

The sample studied is from a limited geographical region of Thailand; hence, there must be some caution in making recommendations for the whole country.

As the outcomes being delivered are seen to be mainly positive by parents and guardians, the policy implication for the Thai Government is that they should continue to promote, and ideally enhance, this kind of early years provision. Results suggest that Thai parents would be well advised to make use of childcare centres to promote the socialisation and development of their children.

The originality of the work derives from the lack of similar systematic studies in Thailand and, in particular, for the rural southern provinces.