CEO’s Report
KU AWARDED
KU Children’s Services
Employer of Choice Award
Australian Business Awards
The Joey Club Brisbane
Service of the Year
Australian Family Early Education
and Care Award
KU Ourimbah
Environmental Education Award
UNAA World Environment Day Awards
KU Starting Points Macarthur
Advocacy for Children Award
NSW Children’s Week Awards
Laure Hislop (Director, KU Killara Park)
Early Childhood Teaching Scholarship
NSW Premier’s Teacher Scholarships
KU Greenwood
Child Care Services Award
Local Business Awards, North Sydney
121st Annual Report 2016
2016 was a year of success and transformation
for KU. Our centres continued to achieve
outstanding National Quality Standard (NQS)
results with 98% of our 106 centres assessed,
being rated ‘Meeting’ or ‘Exceeding’ the
NQS; a proportion significantly higher than
the sector. Three KU centres gained the
highest rating of ‘Excellent’.
Our focus was to embed and consolidate the
outcomes of our transformation program,
Evolution, into our organisational culture.
We recognised our Centre Directors as both
educational and small business leaders,
investing in developing their ability to
positively influence and effect our financial
sustainability, and re-focusing operating
models where we needed to.
KU received an Employer of Choice Award
from the Australian Business Awards and a
number of our centres and individual staff
received external recognition for their work.
KU’s depth of expertise in delivering
programs and advocating for the inclusion
of children with additional needs was
further recognised through the awarding
of expanded contracts and responsibilities
under the new Inclusion Support Programme.
In conjunction with our partner organisations,
KU now provides inclusion support to all
Commonwealth funded services in NSW,
ACT, QLD and VIC, and manages the
Inclusion Development Fund nationally.
The impact of shifting Government policy and
funding mechanisms continue to influence our
operations, reinforcing the need to maintain
our key advocacy role in the sector.
In 2016, a number of KU’s NSW preschools
transitioned to Commonwealth approved
services operating for eight or more hours
per day for at least 48 weeks of the year. All
other preschools realigned their operational
hours in response to the Universal Access
requirement that children be able to access
preschool programs for ’15 hours per week’
in the year before school. Towards the end
of the year, those preschools received a very