Celebrating Early Years Workers on National Nursery Practitioner Day

At Community, we think it is important to celebrate our members, and this includes recognising the efforts of the practitioners and support staff who work in our early years sector.

National Nursery Practitioner Day, which honours the hard work of childcare practitioners across the UK, is a great reminder to do this.

What is National Nursery Practitioner Day?

The annual celebration was launched by the Little Pioneers nursery co-op in 2018 to celebrate the hard work of nursery practitioners while raising awareness of issues such as wellbeing and staff retention in the childcare sector.

On Friday, nurseries up and down the country will be celebrating National Nursery Practitioner Day in their own way and are encouraged to embrace this year’s theme, which is Disco Fever.

Addressing the growing retention crisis

Working in a nursery setting can be very rewarding but our members have also highlighted concerns to do with pay and staff shortages.

To address this growing retention crisis, which is affecting both early year educators and secondary school staff, we recently launched our new education campaign, ‘Retention, Retention, Retention’.

The campaign, which has been informed by research we conducted alongside the Fabian Society, shows 1 in 12 full-time teachers in England have left the workforce since 2024/2025, and a third of all teachers leave English schools within the first five years of qualifying.

The picture looks similar for the early years sector. In late 2023, research published by the Early Education and Childcare Coalition found that around 57% of nursery staff were considering quitting their job in the next 12 months.

In a separate report published in 2025, the National Foundation For Educational Research emphasised that retention is “a significant challenge” for the sector.

Our campaign is calling on the UK and devolved governments to take action to end the teacher and support staff retention crisis across our four nations by adopting our recommendations, which include the promotion of health and safety reps and work to increase non front-loaded financial incentives for retention.

Why nursery workers should join a union

It’s not just staff retention affecting nursery workers – burnout, low pay and lack of support for SEND children are common issues we hear about.

To improve working conditions, employees need a collective voice, which is something a trade union can provide.

Instead of raising concerns alone, nursery practitioners can work with colleagues and union representatives to push for workplace improvements.

Trade unions like Community can also campaign for better wages and fairer pay structures and help workers understand their rights, which is especially important in cases of unfair dismissal or workplace bullying.

The impact of the Employment Rights Act

The Employment Rights Act, which was passed in 2025, is a landmark piece of legislation which was brought about thanks to the hard work of Labour politicians, business groups and unions such as Community.

The Act – which delivers the largest upgrade to employment standards in a generation – has introduced important changes to employment law, including improvements to Statutory Sick Pay and protection when it comes to unfair dismissal.

The Act lowers barriers for statutory trade union recognition, making it easier for unions to establish collective bargaining rights through the Central Arbitration Committee (CAC) – and it also allows more support and protection for union representatives.

Union reps in early years settings can really make a difference by supporting the well-being of practitioners and working to improve the quality of workplace conditions – in turn, improving the education of young children.

On National Nursery Practitioner Day, let’s celebrate our early years workers and recognise the hard work they put into educating the next generation, but let us also remember that this appreciation must go beyond words.

By organising in workplaces across the UK we can fight for better pay and working conditions, ensuring every worker feels happy and secure in their role.