Staffing

Possum Place Child and Vacation Care Centres are staffed by professional teams with a wide range of qualifications, experiences and strengths. 

Early Education Degree

• Primary Teaching Degree (Vacation Care Centre)
• Enrolled Nurse (Mothercraft)
• Diploma Social Services (Child Studies)
• Certificate III (Child Studies)
• Accounting, Administration and Management

We place a strong emphasis on continuing to develop staff skills, knowledge and experiences.  All staff attend annual mandatory training events e.g. child protection; manual handling; emergency evacuation procedures; safe food handling etc.  All staff maintain a current Senior First Aid Certificate.

Individual staff professional development opportunities are supported through budget provisions for external learning activities and annual performance reviews.  Staff undertake ongoing training in curriculum provision which is inclusive of educational, environmental and relationship components accounting for all age groups of children in attendance.

Child Care Centre Staffing

Possum Place Child Care Centre is regulated by Department of Community Services under the Children’s Services Regulation, 2004.  Primary contact staff are allocated to work with a specific group of children, and are designated to be part of a particular team. 

Those teams are as follows:

Bilby room: 10 children – catering for children aged six weeks to 30 months
Three full time staff + one part time staff

Wombat room: 16 children – catering for children aged 24 – 42 months 
Three full time staff + one part time staff

Platypus room: 27 children – catering for children aged 36 – 60 months 
Four full time staff

N.B. Movement to older rooms are not solely based on child’s chronological age – changes are affected by service capacity and the child’s individual needs. Families are consulted prior to any change being implemented.

Staff work on set and rotating rosters.  Each team provides notice of day to day staffing at the entry to the room.

• Permanent relief: One full time and one part-time staff member
• Inclusion Support Scheme staff: Additional funds are provided upon successful application to FACSIA for provision of additional staff to assist children and families with additional needs.  This form of staffing fluctuates due to the number of children and days of attendance of children with additional needs.
• Relief staff: A pool of regular relief staff are utilised to meet the regulated staffing needs of the service with each relief staff member allocated primarily to one of the rooms noted for consistency where possible.

• Non-teaching Director: Full time - Child and Vacation Care Centres + Family Day Care Contracts co-ordinator for HNEHS
• Administration Assistants: Two part time – Child and Vacation Care Centres
• Cleaners: Two part time attend each morning

Vacation Care Centre

Possum Place Vacation Care Centre operates in accordance with the Out of School Hours Care Standards and is registered with DOCS for upcoming Regulations for OOSHC.

Vacation Care Co-ordinator: Part-time (school term), full time (school vacations)
Vacation Care Staff: Four per day – work rostered shifts each vacation period as negotiated with the co-ordinator and in accordance with child:staff ratio requirements
(Most vacation care staff also work as on-call in the child care setting).