Children First

Hungary was the most time constrained of the four implementations. The team had one year, against a method designed for one and a half to two and a half.

It also ran straight into a national political calendar. Local elections were held in summer 2024, and the evaluation is direct about the consequence: “The local authorities, for political reasons, did not want to publish compromising results or make commitments they could not keep, because they would not win the elections.”

The plan was pragmatic and focused on achieving the most for the funded period. Rather than force the full sequence, Partners Hungary broke the process into parts, prioritised setting up the Local Action Teams and establishing genuine professional cooperation, and asked most municipalities only for an outline strategy — while giving the municipalities that were technically and politically ready the support to finish. Győrszemere finished.

The single most universal finding, appearing in seven of eight analyses, was an acute shortage of early childhood specialists — the same professions missing everywhere: speech and language therapist, development teacher, psychologist, special needs teacher, movement therapist, paediatrician.

Kállósemjén had no paediatrician and no family support worker at the time of its analysis. Mezőtúr had an unstaffed paediatric district and waiting lists of several months in child health. Győrszemere made the quality of children’s GP care its number one priority.

Fragmentation caused by centralisation was the second theme. In Győrszemere, national reorganisation in education and health had produced services delivered by six different owners in a village of 3,686 people: a self-employed GP, a midwife transferred to hospital management, a Red Cross-run Sure Start Children’s House, a municipal nursery and kindergarten, a state-run school and a locally run social institution. In Újpest: “Each institution is run by a different owner, so there is a fragmentation of owners, which makes cooperation difficult.”

Professional overload and burnout appeared repeatedly. Tarpa recorded “congestion, fear of burnout, or burnout as a source of danger” and “a strong demand for professional supervision.” Újpest listed staff shortages, capacity problems, turnover, the falling prestige of the profession and an ever-changing legal environment.

Information, again. Even in the smallest settlements, the evaluation lists as one of its most unexpected findings: “Even in small settlements, the biggest gap is a lack of adequate communication about services that are available and working.”

Parents had never been asked. In Újpest, parents reported that providers involved them little in developing services. The local coordinator there put it plainly: “no research on this topic has ever been conducted in such an organised form in the IV district of Budapest.”

Roma inclusion was central in several municipalities. Nagykörű recorded a Roma population of 19–20%, with worse housing and higher unemployment. Tarpa’s analysis warned that spontaneous segregation through free choice of kindergarten and school was producing groups and classes of 100% Roma composition, which “cause integration efforts to fail.”

Ukrainian refugees. Budapest District XIII admitted 50 Ukrainian children to its kindergartens between March and October 2022 and cared for 63 foreign children in its nurseries. Győrszemere hosts a refugee shelter.

And a distinctive Hungarian theme: screen time. Both Kállósemjén and Békéssámson ran “Switch-off” sessions on the impact of digital devices on young children. Újpest flagged “unlimited use of ICT tools” among children and noted professionals’ view that increasing use of smart devices in early childhood has a negative effect on speech development.

There were real strengths too. Kállósemjén and Békéssámson both found that all three sectors were present and working in good cooperation. Tarpa found a better institutional network than surrounding municipalities. Győrszemere’s parents rated the health visitor service 95% good quality and the school 92%. Budapest District XIII had 17 kindergartens with no waiting list and a Family Friendly Concept in place since 2011.

Győrszemere identified four priorities unanimously: the quality of children’s GP care; expanding nursery places and meeting the technical conditions for nursery care; the condition of playgrounds; and support for disadvantaged children starting school.

That third one is worth pausing on. The problem was that teenagers had nowhere to go, so they used and damaged the playgrounds meant for younger children, and parents had nowhere to sit while their own children played. The solution — separating provision for the two age groups and adding covered gazebos — is listed in the evaluation as the most ambitious achievement across the whole Hungarian cohort. It solved a long-standing problem that had nothing to do with early childhood on the surface, and everything to do with it in practice.

Budapest District XIII set four development areas — learning opportunities for children, parental competences, family and community resources, and training professionals — and built a strikingly systemic set of measures around them: district-wide screening tests placed in institutions so they are accessible to all; preventive groups for speech, movement and learning difficulties; an external provider for children without a formal specialist opinion; an integration programme for children who speak little or no Hungarian; a “service map” for parents; and the “One Child Pathway” methodology to regulate hand-offs between sectors.

Mezőtúr built its priorities around one unglamorous, high-value product above all: an information brochure called “Where to turn?”, listing every service, professional, eligibility rule and contact.

Nagykörű put its personnel budget into mental health — psychologist-led parenting forums and weekly individual sessions for children — plus a properly equipped development room.

Kállósemjén, Tarpa and Békéssámson all prioritised parent education, specialist access and play provision for 0–3s.

On process (considering the time constraints):

• 8 of 8 situation analyses completed and approved by the Local Action Teams; 5 formally adopted by municipal councils.
• 8 strategies drafted, 3 completed, 3 fully adopted by council (Békéssámson, Budapest (Újpest) District IV, Győrszemere).
• 9 Local Action Teams established; 64 LAT meetings held across the eight continuing municipalities.
• 14 online team sessions delivered for facilitators and coordinators, deliberately run simultaneously so every municipality received equal support.

On relationships — which is where the real result is:

Mezőtúr’s team expanded to include two police youth protection officers, the Roma rapporteur and the head of the Catholic kindergarten — and agreed to continue as the City Round Table for Children. Nagykörű committed to sustaining its team as an Early Childhood Local Action Group through 2024–2029, meeting bi-monthly, expanded by open call to professionals and parents. Újpest and Budapest District XIII established a professional cooperation with each other that outlasted the project.

On services — every municipality launched something:

• Kállósemjén — a renovated community space at the Sure Start Children’s House, running twice a week: craft sessions, nurse-led talks on hygiene and oral care, a baby-and-mother club, baby massage, childbirth preparation with the midwife, a drive-in cinema, and a “PRIMOKIZ Library” of professional books for parents and professionals. 505 participants: 278 children, 185 parents, 42 professionals.
• Békéssámson — a slide-film club, family craft days, a “Smile Factory” emotional intelligence game community, an interactive folktale show, and children’s corners at the doctor’s surgery, the library and the nurses’ service. New swings and a second playground for 0–3s. A blood pressure monitor so nurses could carry out health assessments. 575 participants: 215 children, 310 parents, 50 professionals — with the note that all programme elements succeeded in involving families from disadvantaged backgrounds. And: “Fathers have also started to participate, which is a very positive change for such a small community.”
• Tarpa — group speech therapy sessions and weekly individual sessions in the nursery and kindergarten, plus individual therapy and parent counselling on demand. As the summary puts it: “a big step forward for disadvantaged and severely disadvantaged children and parents, who are unable to access these services on their own due to their low income.”
• Újpest — the Storytelling Mamas and Baby Mama Club launched at the K25 community space, with growing weekly attendance; several sessions a week of foundation therapy, with twenty children given free access to a therapy that 30% of surveyed parents said they could not afford.
• Nagykörű — a development room equipped; a psychologist for parents and children; and a set of health screening equipment for the GP and health visitor, including a foetal heart monitor, a paediatric screening audiometer, a digital infant scale and a breathing monitor to prevent cot death — several of these lent out to parents free of charge.
• Győrszemere — wooden gazebos on three playgrounds as meeting points for children and parents, and outdoor toys suitable for 0–3s in the courtyard of the Children’s House.

The evaluation makes a point about the health equipment that should not be lost: “The underfunding of the health care system prevents the most basic health screening of newborns from being carried out. They were able to acquire these tools from Primokiz financial support.”

On families:

• Inclusion in practice, Kállósemjén — listed as the most unexpected result of all: “It is a safe space that provides regular care, where Roma and Ukrainian refugees can play together with the children of local residents.”
• Parent satisfaction — in an impact survey of parents and professionals rating the results from 1 to 5, 29% rated the work very successful and 56% quite successful.
• A shift in parents’ role — the evaluation’s “most lasting achievement”: “Previously, parents were not consulted or involved in early childhood development. Today, many parents have an opinion and are interested in the psychological and health development of their child.”

Three lessons come out of the Hungarian evaluation more sharply than anywhere else.

Mayoral commitment is the variable that decides everything. “It was not the less time that caused the lag in some settlements, but the first step: the lack of full professional commitment.” The one municipality that dropped out — Nagymaros — did so because the mayor could not fully involve himself. The one that finished during the grant-supported implementation, did so, in part, because it was small enough and politically secure enough that the mayor could act. Size was not the factor: “It is not the size of the settlement, but rather the result of a professional and personal decision, which mayor participated in the professional work.”

Both entry motives lead to the same place. Municipalities with smaller budgets applied mainly for the money and treated the method as secondary. Better-resourced municipalities applied for the professional development. “In both cases, it exceeded their expectations and they were extremely satisfied with the professional results.”

The analysis itself is a product. “In most Hungarian municipalities there is no such comprehensive, detailed research and survey on early childhood services. Even where there is, it is rather a document that is not used. It is also unique in that the programme specifically asks for the views of parents and children.”

And a note on what a strategy means. Hungarian participants described their previous experience of strategies as documents rarely felt by the people they concerned and mostly forgotten in the next government cycle. Primokiz was different because the priorities were compiled with everyone who works in early childhood, because residents, professionals and children were actually heard, and because the development areas in the strategy match the needs in the analysis.