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The government introduced 20 hours per week of free childcare on Monday to boost early childhood development. Archive picture: Claude Meisch, the education minister, speaks at a press conference on 14 September 2017. Photo: Education Ministry’s Facebook page 

By embracing the early future (the campaign slogan), the DP education minister Claude Meisch launched a new initiative on Monday 9 October for pre-school-aged youngsters. According to the education ministry, the project, entitled “Staark Kanner” (strong children) aims to foster children’s skills which could affect their school achievement in later years.

Free child care

For children between the age of 1 and 4, the initiative offers 20 hours of free childcare per week in every crèche across the grand duchy. Moreover, the ministry announced an adjustment of the “chèque-service accueil” (childcare vouchers): a tariff reduction service for families with children up to the age of 12 who haven’t left primary school.

Besides the 20 hours of free crèche support, multilingual education in both Luxembourgish and French started on 2 October. The ministry reiterated that Luxembourgish remains the language of integration and will also be introduced in facilities which had only communicated in French.

Involving parents

Another pillar of the initiative aims to support parents and their responsibility towards their child’s education. Accordingly, the ministry will release brochures twice a year which inform parents about the different aspects of their child’s development.

The first edition--published in four languages including English (PDF)--has already been distributed and is dedicated to the discovery of different languages.