Early Childhood Ethical Dilemmas

The most challenging aspects of early childhood professionals are to deal with the frequent professional, personal, legal and ethical dilemmas. This case study is to analyse, identify and respond to the above scenario, which is recognised as an ethical dilemma. The case study details about the role of the educator, stakeholders such as Anna, Lee and Lee’s sister, education service, local community members and colleagues. The case study also portrays about the legal and ethical obligations, complexities of the educator’s decision and action against Anna’s act of unethical approaches. The information provided in the case study are directly linked to the EYLF (2009), VIT Code of Conduct (2012), Australian Code of Ethics (ECA) 2016, and National

Anna seems to be influenced by alcohol, her slurred speech, bloodshot eyes and the alcohol smell in her breath indicated this. As an educator, it is important to be aware not only of their own personal professional values, but also should consider to the values of others. Where, these values would impact on solving professional and ethical dilemmas (Blaise & Nuttall, 2011). Hence, the educator has to be careful in her decision and ensure all possibilities when reviewing the risk for all stakeholders (Kearns, 2014). The symptoms identified from Anna could also be related to the health issues such as over dose of pills and diabetic issue often mistaken for intoxication (State Government of Victoria, 2015). At the same time, if there is no exact proof of Anna struggling from some sort of impacts. Then, this could be an issue of serious health and safety risk for her children, herself and other people on the road. As an immediate action, the education center should collaborate with community people and services to discuss the situation and to take actions that support Anna and children. It is educator’s responsibility to focus on Anna’s perspectives and decision, which could impact on her children’s and other’s wellbeing (VIT, 2015). In this situation, it is essential for other colleagues to support the particular educator to adopt and proceed

Early childhood professionals have to focus on all legal and statutory requirements, which are highly regulated, and it is essential to have a reasonable understanding of the legal obligations (Kearns, 2010). UNICEF (1998) states that there are number of local, state/territory and national government requirements such as child protection legislation, occupational health and safety, anti-discrimination requirements, public health regulations , commission for children and young People, and human rights and equal opportunity requirements (Kearns, 2010). Early childhood professionals have to understand their duty of care, which is a legal responsibility to take care and work on achieving appropriate standards (ACECQA, 2011). In Australia, the National Quality Framework [NQF] is created to provide consistent approaches to regulate and ensure the quality assessment in Australian early childhood education and care services (Kearns,