Early Childhood Education
Participation in high quality ECE has significant benefits for children and their future learning ability. ECE can positively impact literacy, numeracy, and problem-solving skills well into the teenage years. ECE also encourages the development of cognitive and attitudinal competencies, and leads to higher levels of achievement and better social outcomes.
ECE Participation has been identified as a key factor in supporting vulnerable children which has led to its inclusion in the Better Public Services Programme, launched in 2012. This Programme aims to increase participation in early childhood education to 98% of all new entrants by 2016
Identical information is available by regional council and territorial local authority through the Know Your Region pages.
Alternatively a large amount of early childhood education participation data is available from our statistics pages. See ECE Participation.
Table 1: Prior participation in early childhood education by ethnic group and gender (2023-2025)
| 0 |
x |
x |
0 |
x |
x |
na | x | x |
| x |
0 |
x |
x |
0 |
x |
x | na | x |
| 0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
na | na | na |
| 0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
na | na | na |
| x |
x |
x |
x |
x |
x |
x | x | x |
| 0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
na | na | na |
| 0 |
x |
x |
0 |
x |
x |
na | x | x |
| x |
x |
1 |
x |
x |
5 |
x | x | 83.3 |
Notes:
- The data presented here are for the 12 months ending 31 December for each year. These data may differ slightly from earlier or later quarterly updates.
- ‘x’ = data has been suppressed where there are between 0 and 5 students in the denominator for a specific group, for example Asian students. Where one gender has been suppressed the corresponding gender has also been suppressed. Please note schools with small numbers of new entrants (less than 20) often are subject to large fluctuations and may not provide a very reliable basis for comparison with other categories. ‘na’ = not applicable.
- Ethnicity is multiple response, that is, students who affiliated in more than one ethnic group have been counted in each ethnic group. MELAA (Middle Eastern, Latin American and African) are included under Other Students. MELAA (Middle Eastern, Latin American and African) are included under Other Students. Students are only counted once in the total, therefore, the ethnic groups may not sum to the total.
- The number of students with unknown prior ECE attendance has been excluded from both the numerator and denominator when calculating participation rates.
Table 2: Comparison prior participation in early childhood education data (2023-2025)
| x |
x |
1 |
x |
x |
5 |
x | x | 83.3 |
| 237 |
228 |
190 |
6,205 |
6,310 |
6,052 |
96.3 | 96.5 | 97.0 |
| 723 |
694 |
638 |
21,345 |
21,410 |
20,728 |
96.7 | 96.9 | 97.0 |
| 1,727 |
1,679 |
1,548 |
50,920 |
51,007 |
48,374 |
96.7 | 96.8 | 96.9 |
| 1,970 |
1,937 |
1,748 |
57,932 |
58,203 |
55,404 |
96.7 | 96.8 | 96.9 |
Notes:
- ‘x’ = data has been suppressed where there are between 0 and 5 students in the denominator for a specific group, for example Asian students. Where one gender has been suppressed the corresponding gender has also been suppressed. Please note schools with small numbers of new entrants (less than 20) often are subject to large fluctuations and may not provide a very reliable basis for comparison with other categories. ‘na’ = not applicable.
- Ethnicity is multiple response, that is, students who affiliated in more than one ethnic group have been counted in each ethnic group. Students are only counted once in the total, therefore, the ethnic groups may not sum to the total.
- The number of students with unknown prior ECE attendance has been excluded from both the numerator and denominator when calculating participation rates.
Early Childhood Education
Participation in high quality ECE has significant benefits for children and their future learning ability. ECE can positively impact literacy, numeracy, and problem-solving skills well into the teenage years. ECE also encourages the development of cognitive and attitudinal competencies, and leads to higher levels of achievement and better social outcomes.
ECE Participation has been identified as a key factor in supporting vulnerable children which has led to its inclusion in the Better Public Services Programme, launched in 2012. This Programme aims to increase participation in early childhood education to 98% of all new entrants by 2016
Identical information is available by regional council and territorial local authority through the Know Your Region pages.
Alternatively a large amount of early childhood education participation data is available from our statistics pages. See ECE Participation.
Notes:
Notes: