Seeding success: identifying factors that contribute to positive early childhood health and development in Aboriginal children

Seeding Success

Funded by NHMRC Project Grant.

Promoting positive early childhood development is fundamental to improving life opportunities and outcomes for Aboriginal Australians. However, national data show that a significant proportion of Aboriginal children have markers of developmental vulnerability at school entry and this tracks through to poor literacy and numeracy outcomes across all schooling years. We currently lack information about the key drivers of positive early childhood development in Aboriginal children, and the features of local communities and early childhood service provision that make a tangible difference.

Seeding Success aims to address this information gap using linked routinely collected health, welfare and education data, from birth to school age, for all children who started school in NSW in 2009 and 2012. It will determine which social, perinatal and early childhood health factors predict positive early childhood development from birth to school age in Aboriginal children, and test the impact of two early childhood services (Aboriginal Maternal and Infant Health Services and the Brighter Futures program) in promoting positive early childhood development in Aboriginal children.

Project team

Project collaborators: External

Professor Sandra Eades
Baker IDI Heart & Diabetes Institute
Professor John Lynch
The University of Adelaide
Professor Emily Banks
Australian National University
Professor Rhonda Craven
Australian Catholic University
Dr Kristjana Einarsdottir
Telethon Kids Institute, University of Western Australia
Ms Elizabeth Best
NSW Kids and Families
Associate Professor Sharon Goldfeld
The Royal Children’s Hospital & Murdoch Childrens Research Institute
Professor Alastair Leyland
University of Glasgow
Ms Marilyn Chilvers
NSW Family and Community Services

Key contact

Medicine & Health
k.falster@unsw.edu.au