The Early Development Instrument (EDI) provides a population measure of how children are developing and the extent to which they are ‘school ready’ or ‘ready to learn’. Two national Australian Early Development Census (AEDC) collections have offered a great deal of descriptive data about the developmental domains for each community but policy makers and practitioners are still faced with the challenge of how best to interpret AEDC information and take action. This presentation examines a number of underexplored aspects of the AEDC including: the importance of combining AEDC data with local, contextual evidence, why special needs children are not included in the reporting of the AEDC and the possible impact on your community, and closing feedback loops so Early Childhood Educators have the opportunity to be more involved in AEDC-related action.

1. Just scraping the surface: How to get
more value out of your AEDC data
Sonia Whiteley
The Social Research Centre
ARACY Conference, 24th–26th June 2015

2. Before we start – Questions and notes
• There will be time for questions, although some might
need to be ‘on notice’
• This presentation is available (so there’s no need to write
anything down unless you feel inspired!)
• The AEDC was formerly known as the Australian Early
Development Index, so some references and resources
are still referred to or branded as ‘AEDI’.

3. Before we start – About the SRC
We are a private, for-profit
company owned by
ANU Enterprise
Our services include:
• survey design and
execution,
• qualitative research,
• survey data
management,
• statistical consulting and
• analytical reporting.

4. And our role in the AEDC
• Collection of the AEDC data (the census!) every three
years
• Maintaining the AEDC website and AEDC data explorer
• Managing the AEDC data holdings (2009, 2012 and
2015)
• Creating summary AEDC reports (eg Community &
School Profiles)
• Supporting policy makers and practitioners to use the
AEDC data

5. Presentation overview
1. Special needs children and the AEDC
(Why am I hijacking my own presentation?)
2. AEDC data ‘in context’

6. How is the AEDC data collected?
• Data collection commences in May of a census year
(2015!) and concludes in August
• Each teacher has secure access to a list of students in
their classes
• AEDC items are completed via an online survey for
each student in their first year of school
• Completions are monitored at a student, school and
jurisdictional level throughout the collection.

7. What questions are asked?

8. What happens after the census finishes?
• We download all of the records and remove all AEDC
information from the server
• The file is cleaned and checked for duplicates
• Community boundary information is confirmed with
the jurisdictions
• Each community is examined to maximise the amount of
reportable data and communities
• Final files are produced to create the main AEDC data reports
• 2015 data to be released in the first half of 2016

9. The main data reports include:
• National reports
– Data on the headline AEDC findings
– National and state-based comparisons
• Community profiles
– Results for each local community by domain
– Demographics and characteristics of children surveyed
• School profiles
– Results for schools by domain
What reports are produced?

10. What about the special needs kids?
• They are included in the collection but excluded from
the data set and the reporting frameworks
– There is currently no analysis of the special needs children in
the national reports or the community or school profiles
– Special needs schools that participate in the AEDC do not
receive a school profile
• Occasionally, this information is analysed, usually at a
national level

11. Number of children with special needs – 2012
State/Territory Male Female Total S/T Male (%)
New South Wales 3,227 1,397 4,624 NSW 69.8
Victoria 2,473 1,019 3,492 VIC 70.8
Queensland 2,148 899 3,047 QLD 70.5
Western Australia 797 314 1,111 WA 71.7
South Australia 875 357 1,232 SA 71.0
Tasmania 180 65 245 TAS 73.5
Australian Capital Territory 180 58 238 ACT 75.6
Northern Territory 133 51 184 NT 72.3
Total 10,013 4,160 14,173 Average 71.9

12. Percentage of children with special needs – 2012
State/Territory Male (%) Female (%) Total (%)
New South Wales 6.7 3.0 4.9
Victoria 7.1 3.1 5.1
Queensland 6.7 3.0 4.9
Western Australia 4.8 2.0 3.5
South Australia 9.1 3.8 6.5
Tasmania 5.4 2.1 3.8
Australian Capital Territory 7.0 2.5 4.9
Northern Territory 7.4 3.0 5.3
Average 6.8 2.8 4.9

13. But what do they do for the Canadian EDI?
• Special needs children are not
reported on in detail as part of the
mainstream Early Development
Index reports
• Each community with more than
40 children identified as having
special needs receives a
supplementary profile

14. How many communities in Australia ‘qualify’?
• In 2012, 116 (20%) of the 594 AEDC communities had
more than 40 children with special needs
• This equates to 4,107 (29%) children of the 14,173
with special needs
• A number of communities have more than 200
children with special needs
• Others have more than 1 in 10 children with
special needs

15. And where are these communities located?
State/Territory Number of communities
New South Wales 39
Victoria 34
Queensland 23
Western Australia 8
South Australia 7
Tasmania 1
Australian Capital Territory 3
Northern Territory 1
Total 116

16. Why isn’t this information made available?
• Historical reasons?
• Resourcing problems?
• Belief that the issue is ‘known’ and being addressed?
• Concerns that the EDI isn’t appropriate / relevant?

17. Special needs children and the 2015 AEDC
• The 2015 collection includes special needs children and
special schools
• There are currently no plans to provide any reports on
these children
• Given the consistency of the findings across collections,
it is likely that between four and five per cent of children
will be identified as having special needs in 2015

18. Next steps?
• We need feedback from the sector – let us know if your
school or your community would like us to report on
children with special needs
– What would you like reported?
– Why is it important to your school or community?
• Researchers also need to let us know if they have
projects that require this data.
Email support@aedc.gov.au or call 1800 092 548

19. AEDC data in context
• AEDC data was never intended to be analysed in isolation
– it is just one piece of the puzzle
• Current reports include a small amount of ABS data
• ABS data is also available in the AEDC Data Explorer
– SEIFA
– Labour force status
– Single parent under 25
– Completed Year 12

20. Contextual data is available online
www.aedc.gov.au/
data/data-explorer

21. Contextual data for 2015
• Planning to retain the current suite of ABS data elements
• Discussions have been around what else to include:
– Year of arrival in Australia
– Highest level of educational attainment
– Family household composition
– Household income
– Tenure & household time (own vs rent vs social housing)

22. Other data sources?
• Population level data required – alternative sources?
– If sub-population data (e.g. jurisdications, communities) what
about consistency and extra effort required to create, display
and update
• Administrative data (e.g. Medicare, Centrelink)
– Data quality issues
– May or may not require data linkage (lead times)

23. Next steps?
• We need feedback from the sector – let us know what type
of contextual information you need
– What else should we use aside from ABS data?
– Why is it important to your school or community?
• Researchers also need to let us know if they have projects
that require ‘standard’ contextual data
Email support@aedc.gov.au or call 1800 092 548

24. Thank you!