Early childhood education

[repton_infinity]

http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/education/7641487/Call-to-lower-school-age-to-four

Stuff reports:
A South Auckland early childhood education taskforce set up to tackle the problem found only 27 per cent of new entrants have had any form of early childhood education. Nationally, participation rate is 94.7 per cent, with Maori and Pacific Island children at the lower end of the scale.

Two things spring to mind:
(1) If nationwide 95% of kids are in ECE, then what's the problem? We don't need big solutions. At best, we need targetted initiatives (if the 5% not in ECE are largely in specific groups).
(2) Do those numbers add up?

Let's take "Manukau City" for South Auckland and consult the 2006 census.

1. Total population: 4.03 million
2. Manukau population: 0.33 million
3. Overall population aged 0-4: 7%
4. Manukau population aged 0-4: 9%
5. Overall population in ECE: 95% (from Stuff article)
6. Manukau population in ECE: 27% (from stuff article)

I'll make the assumption that one quarter of the 0-4 population are next year's new entrants.

1. New entrants overall: 70,000
2. New entrants in ECE: 67,000 → thus 3,000 not in ECE
3. New entrants in Manukau: 7,400
4. New entrants in Manukau in ECE: 2,000 → thus 5,400 not in ECE

So, that would be a "no" then. I wonder what the real national participation rate is...