What is PELS?
The Pacific Early Learning Services or PELS, is a collective of the six Pacific early childhood centres based in Ōtautahi, Christchurch.
Our centres combine rich curriculum with Pacific indigenous language and culture for our young children.
Why does PELS exist?
Pacific centres are important and valuable cornerstones in our communities. Early childhood education plays a vital role in the development of our children as the brain develops more between 0-5 than any other time across a persons life. This is combined with the importance of providing a safe space for a child’s language and culture to be shared and celebrated. But as critical as our centres are, the number of them across Aotearoa, New Zealand are dwindling.
The purpose of the collective coming together is to share knowledge, expertise, and collaborate to keep our centres thriving.
“E so’o le fau i le fau- strength in unity”
Samoan alaga’upu/proverb
What does PELS want to achieve?
A recruitment strategy was created for PELS which underpins and guides the work and projects that we deliver. Creating the strategy involved interviewing staff, parents, and the community. The strategy proposed a number of recommendations which look at achieving three main goals:
Enhance and strengthen the pipeline
Retain and develop current staff
Create and refine brand
Following the recommendations PELS delivers a number of initiatives, projects, and events in collaboration with the community and tertiary partners. By doing these things we look to:
Raise awareness of our Pacific centres
Raise awareness of teaching as a career pathway
Work with local tertiary providers to promote study pathways, looking to increase number of Pacific learners studying early childhood education
Increase number of enrolments across centres
Increase the number of qualified Pacific teachers in our centres
Who is in the PELS collective?
The six centres that make up the collective are
Hornby Pasifika Early Learning Centre
Lalaga Preschool
Kidsfirst Niu
Mapuaga Aoga Amata
Tafesilafa’i Early Learning Centre
Tino e Tasi Preschool
For more information please refer to Our Centres page