The Department for Education will be publishing a tendering opportunity to commission an organisation to assess and approve Level 3 and above early years qualifications and courses against the new Early Years Educator criteria, to be published in Spring and come into effect from September 2024.

The Early Years Educator (EYE) Level 3 criteria review is one of the programmes within the Early Years Education Recovery (EYER) package.

This review contributes to the EYRP by updating and improving the EYE Level 3 criteria, responding directly to sector feedback on the need for improving the quality of EYE Level 3 qualifications.

For more information on the EYER package, please visit Early Years Education Recovery Programme - GOV.UK.

To respond to sector feedback, in summer 2022, we launched a review, conducted by NCFE, of the EYE qualification, including the criteria.

Recommendations for revisions to the criteria were made based on NCFE's findings.

The consultation for the revised criteria was conducted online over an 8-week period from 28 November 2022 to Monday 23 January 2023.

The Early Years Educator Level 3 criteria set out the minimum expected standards for what a practitioner qualified to Level 3 should know, understand and be able to do to be when delivering the Early Years Foundation Stage statutory framework (EYFS).

The primary objective of the successful contractor is to, on behalf of the department as regulator, assess existing and new qualifications, against this new criteria and 'approve' those qualifications that meet the criteria.

This will allow holders of these qualifications to be considered as a Level 3 qualified member of staff within an early years setting.

There are up to c.242 approved courses (pre Sept 2014/post Sept 2014)) currently listed in the EYQL that will need assessing and, potentially, advising on how to update.

This does not account for any new qualifications that might be added.

The organisation will do this by: - Working with the further and higher education sector, and private training providers, to inform them of the regulatory need to have their qualifications approved against the new criteria. - Assessing and approving existing qualifications and courses submitted by awarding organisations and training providers who have adapted their qualifications and courses against the new criteria. - Assessing and approving new qualifications and courses submitted by awarding organisations and training providers against the new criteria. - Where a qualification is not assessed as meeting the new criteria, advising on how the qualification be improved to meet the new criteria. - Monitor the Early Years Educator Qualifications list of qualifications and provide the department with regular updates as to how many qualifications have been submitted/updated, so that the department can follow up with any awarding organisation and training providers as appropriate.