A child who only starts school at the age of seven? The toddler consultant tries to prevent that

The cries of babies can be heard behind closed doors in the Center for Youth and Family (CJG) on the Paviljoensgracht in The Hague. Strollers are parked in a row. Parents who come in look around searching. An employee rushes over: are they coming for a hearing test or vaccination? Or do they have an appointment to examine their child’s health and development?

Toddler consultants Hafsa Belhaj (43) and Esen Pamay (38) sit behind their laptops at a table and estimate the ages of all the children who enter the center. They are looking for toddlers who do not yet go to preschool, but are eligible. In children older than two months they are alert. That is the age at which parents can register their children for such an educational program, where the development of young children is stimulated.

“If a toddler has a bottle or pacifier, I think: he or she is not yet in preschool,” says Pamay. “Or if they are not yet walking at that age, because a lot of attention is paid to motor development in preschool.”

Migrant workers often keep their children at home longer than is usual here. That is harmful

All toddlers between two and a half and four years old with a language delay or stagnant development can attend preschool for free for sixteen hours a week in The Hague. Councilor Hilbert Bredemeijer (CDA, Education) made this possible with effect from January 2024. Primary schools in The Hague complained that more and more new students are not ‘school-ready’. Because they do not speak Dutch, are not toilet trained or have not learned to interact with other children. They are also often not four when they first go to school, the age at which most children in the Netherlands start, but older, because they come from a country where children do not start school until they are six or seven.

To inform parents about the preschool and help them with registration, the councilor made money available for nine toddler consultants. They are not employed by the municipality, but appointed with a subsidy through JongLeren, the largest provider of preschool education in The Hague. “But we work together with all preschool learning places, playgroups, daycare centers and primary schools in The Hague that offer such an educational program to young children,” says Belhaj. To avoid confusion, the consultants call it all ‘the preschool’.

Home sitters

The number of children out of school is increasing across the country. In the 2023-2024 school year, The Hague – which has almost eighty thousand children and young people from five to seventeen years old – had almost 1,500 people sitting at home. Almost half were newcomers to the Netherlands. Bredemeijer: “We have seen an increase in the number of migrant workers in our city in recent years. They often keep their children at home longer than is usual here. That is harmful for those children, because they arrive at primary school behind. But also for society, because it puts enormous pressure on education, where there is already a teacher shortage.”

In addition to these people sitting at home, The Hague has almost six hundred children aged four who do not go to school. They are not yet officially required to attend school, but the councilor does want them to go to school. He encourages parents through letters to register their child at a primary school early. And if a four-year-old child is not yet registered, he has officials contact him to ask what is going on.

State Secretary Mariëlle Paul (Fundamental Education, VVD) is investigating whether the compulsory education age can be lowered from five to four years and whether disadvantaged children can be sent to pre-school education. In addition, the government wants to make childcare almost free for working parents, but that will not happen until 2027 at the earliest.

The Hague councilor did not want to wait for all that, because more than half of the children in The Hague are in danger of starting school behind. He lowered the threshold for preschool by making it free for all children in the city who need it, regardless of parental income.

Previously, parents had to arrange a lot if they wanted to use the preschool: they had to apply for childcare allowance from the Tax Authorities and receive an indication from the CJG, then the municipality paid the remaining parental contribution. That red tape was a barrier.

Now all children aged two and a half to four years in the districts of The Hague Southwest and Laak, where many children are behind, automatically receive an indication that allows them to attend preschool for free for sixteen hours a week. The toddler consultants help parents of children from other neighborhoods find out what they are entitled to.

Bubble blowing

The toddler consultants are stationed in neighborhoods with many migrant workers. Belhaj does Bouwlust and Vrederust and works together with Pamay in Transvaal. One day they install themselves with their laptops in a CJG, where many young parents come, the next day in Juliana Plaza, the ‘living room’ of Transvaal, or in the Local Information Point, where migrant workers can ask questions about everything they encounter. in the Netherlands. Belhaj: “We also start conversations with parents on the street, in playgrounds or the petting zoo.”

Parents from all over the city come to the CJG where they are today, near the Grote Markt metro stop. “Every registration is taken into account,” says Pamay, “even if it is a child who does not come from one of our neighborhoods.” With a quick observation, the toddler consultants try to determine the cultural background of the families. If parents speak Dutch or English, it does not matter who approaches them. If it is Moroccan or Arabic, Belhaj stands up. If they speak Turkish, it is Pamay’s turn.

Sometimes they do not have a BSN number. Then we reassure them: they do not need that to register their child

Pamay speaks to a couple who speak Turkish among themselves. They have heard from family that there are places in the Netherlands where toddlers can play and learn. Pamay asks if they also know that it is free. The woman looks pleasantly surprised. The consultant notes down their details and gives them a bag containing, among other things, a coloring page, water bottle, bubble blower and a brochure. On the table are trays with leaflets in Dutch, Arabic, Moroccan and Turkish, but also in Polish, Bulgarian, French, Greek, Spanish and Tingrinya, the language spoken in Eritrea and Ethiopia.

The toddler consultants speak to about a hundred parents every month. An estimated quarter of these conversations lead to registration at preschool. Belhaj walks to a father with a child. It turns out he is from Pakistan and has applied for asylum in the Netherlands. “They don’t have residency status yet,” Belhaj says afterwards. “If it doesn’t work out, they go back to Italy.” The preschool is of later concern for this family.

Subletting

Before she became a toddler consultant, Belhaj was a pedagogical employee at a daycare center for 23 years. “When I got this job, I thought: we’ll just do that. But in practice it is not that easy.” Parents regularly react with caution, she says. They prefer to keep their child at home as long as it is not compulsory to attend school. “In Turkey, children only start school at the age of six and in Bulgaria at the age of seven. And compulsory education is not always strictly enforced there. If you say to such a parent: ‘Your child has to go to preschool at the age of two and a half’, that is a very big difference.”

Parents who came to the Netherlands to work are still searching themselves, says Pamay. “They don’t speak the language and don’t know the rules and customs. That creates a lot of uncertainty. Sometimes they live illegally in subletting and are not registered with the municipality. Or they do not have a BSN number. We then reassure them that they can also register their child without that information.”

It is not only migrant workers who keep their children at home for a long time. Toddler consultants will soon also start working in Duindorp. Pamay: “That is a very white neighborhood and children do not go to preschool there either.”

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