About the hubs
The Mayor's Early Years Hubs Programme ran from January 2018 to December 2020 and formed part of the Mayor’s wider work to support London's early years sector.
Three hubs were set up and awarded £175,000 each to bring together local partners and their services. This collaboration aimed to improve access to high-quality early education for the capital's less advantaged families.
The benefits of accessible, good quality childcare are clear all round – parents will be able to return to work, children will have more access to quality early years education, and employers will be able to reap the benefits of having skilled and eager parents back in the workplace.
About the hubs
-
3
Early Years Hubs were commissioned
-
£175k
In funding was given to each hub over 3 years
-
501
Early years providers became members of their local hub
-
3949
Early years practitioners directly participated in hub activities
What is a hub?
The three hubs created through the Mayor's Early Years Hubs Programme were:
BEYA Hub
- Hub location: East Central locality of London Borough of Barnet
- Lead organisation: Barnet Early Years Alliance (BEYA)
Wandle Early Years Hub
- Hub location: Working across the London Boroughs of Wandsworth and Merton
- Lead organisation: Chesterton Primary School
Working Together Hub
- Hub location: London Borough of Newham
- Lead organisation: Sheringham Nursery School and Children's Centre
These hubs can best be described as local networks, rather than physical places.
As you can see, each hub had a geographic focus and was made up of:
- a lead organisation, with responsibility for the hub's coordination and administration (in this case, each hub was led by a teaching school)
- a small group of core partners, including the local authority, health and training providers, to support the lead organisation strategically and operationally
- a larger group of hub members, made up of local early years providers. Membership of the hub allowed access to networking, training and support.
What were the hubs' aims?
Building on a theory of change published in the Mayor's Early Years in London Report, all three hubs worked towards four aims:
- To improve take-up of early education
- To improve quality of early education through collaboration
- To promote early education as a career choice
- To support local parents into employment
"Affordable, quality early years education and childcare provision is crucial to London’s infrastructure. It enables parents to work, improves children’s outcomes and helps narrow the gap between disadvantaged children and their more affluent peers."
- Joanne McCartney, Deputy Mayor for Education and Childcare
What worked?
The Early Years Hubs Programme was externally evaluated by a team of independent consultants, Diane Dixon Associates (DDA).
Visit the 'evaluating the hubs' page of this toolkit to:
- hear direct from hub leads about what worked locally in these fantastic videos
- read DDA's full evaluation report
- find out more about the evaluation's aims and methodology
- read a summary of the hubs' key achievements.
Using this toolkit
This toolkit it designed for anybody who's interested in the Mayor's Early Years Hubs Programme, including local authorities, teaching schools and other organisations looking to set up their own local hub.
It's packed with ideas, tips, learning and downloadable resources.
You can explore the full toolkit, or pick and choose what's useful to you from the list below:
- setting up and managing a hub
- improving take-up of early education
- improving quality of early education - including info on collaborative working, CPD opportunities, and activities for parents and children
- promoting careers in early years and improving parental employability
- evaluating the hubs.
The toolkit was produced by Diane Dixon Associates (DDA), the independent evaluator of the Mayor's Early Years Hubs Programme, with input from the hubs, who supplied tools and documents.
More information and contact details
For more information and questions:
- get the hubs' contact details if you want to get in touch with them direct
- visit our website to find out about other ways the Mayor is supporting London's early years sector
- email [email protected] for general queries about the Mayor's work (including the hubs)
- read press releases from when the Deputy Mayor for Education and Childcare visited hub members in Barnet, (June 2019) Wandsworth (October 2019) and Newham (March 2020).
Need a document on this page in an accessible format?
If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need a version of a PDF or other document on this page in a more accessible format, please get in touch via our online form and tell us which format you need.
It will also help us if you tell us which assistive technology you use. We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 5 working days.