The impact of EPPE on policy and practice
From the outset EPPE was designed to inform policy and everyday practice. When integrated
provision came into the policy realm, EPPE added this pre-school type to its sample. When
government turned its attention to combating social exclusion, EPPE concentrated in its analysis
on the effects of different kinds of pre-school on vulnerable children. When new forms of
qualification were devised, EPPE analysed the contribution of staff training on children’s learning.
An expert steering committee contributed to the ‘policy steer’; it included policy makers at
national and local level as well as practitioners, academics and researchers.
The case studies have always been a vital part in the design; they show in detail and ‘on the
ground’ how staff teams can function effectively, how children’s play can be extended and lifted
to new heights of intellectual challenge, and how parents and staff can work together so that the
‘learning environments’ of home and pre-school are harmonized and stretched.
The impact has been seen at four levels:
• National policy-through evidence at Parliamentary Select Committees, Ministerial
Briefings and contributions to the Spending Review at departmental and Treasury and
evidence to teams preparing government reports and policy documents.
• Local authority policy - through disseminations to local officers and Elected Members
of local authorities seeking to reconfigure their early years services. Also locally
through workshops and training usually organised by the Early Years Development
and Care Partnerships.
• Practitioners and Parents - through lectures, seminars and workshops focused on
practical pedagogies. We have also been reported widely in practitioner publications
e.g. Nursery World, Primary Practice, etc. One of the unanticipated impacts of EPPE
has been the way it has raised awareness of rigorous methods in carrying out ‘policy-
sensitive research’. We have anecdotal evidence showing that people at every level
of expertise are now asking ‘How do you know it works?’
• Academic/Research community - The Team have published twelve technical papers,
explicitly showing the workings out of the analyses and descriptions of the research
instruments. We have submitted papers to prestigious research journals and have
contributed to the debate about effective early years schooling through attendance at
a range of academic conferences in a number of countries. The EPPE team
developed a new instrument for assessing the quality of curricular provision, the
ECERS-E. This is being widely used in the U.S. now because they too are interested
in curriculum and pedagogy in the Early Years. In addition to developing the ECERS-
E, the team developed the interview schedule for assessing the ‘home learning
environment’. This scale is being used in other research studies in the U.K. The
project is affiliated to the ESRC Teaching and Learning Programme.
The EPPE project has become well known for its contribution to ‘evidence based policy’ in early
years education and care. Its findings are robust because they are based on sound and
innovative research methods. The implications for policy of the EPPE project have been spelled
out clearly and are being discussed - and acted upon - at national and local level. EPPE set out
to contribute to the debate about the education and care of young children; the EPPE design
targeted issues that could ‘make a difference’ to the lives of young children and their families.
The research is now extended in the continuation study, EPPE 3-11 also funded by the DfES, to
find out if the effects of early education that were so evident at ages 5 and 7 continue through to
the age 11. Moreover, the team will investigate the way in which educational experiences in Key
Stage 2 interact with the earlier pre-school experiences in the shaping of cognitive and
social/behavioural outcomes for children.
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