Melanie Excell

Mel has worked in early childhood education and care since 2002. She is a university-trained teacher with a Bachelor of Education, and has held almost every role the sector has to offer — early childhood teacher, centre director, area manager, and senior operations manager — before joining Little Scholars in 2016.

As Operations Manager at Little Scholars, Mel is responsible for quality and operational standards across all 17 campuses, from the Gold Coast through Brisbane, Ipswich and Redland Bay. Her focus is on making sure the standard families are promised is the standard delivered — that every campus meets the needs of the child and the family around them, and that educators are properly trained, mentored and supported to deliver a high standard of care.

Child safety and wellbeing sits at the centre of that work. As a recognised Children's Rights Queensland Ambassador, Mel advocates for children's rights across the state, and within Little Scholars she leads the work of embedding child safe practice as a lived culture rather than a compliance exercise: educators who are confident to speak up, children who understand their voice counts, and leadership that takes the difficult conversation early.

Mel's broader interest is in the workforce itself. Having started as an educator, she is a consistent advocate for better training pathways, stronger mentoring and genuine career progression in early childhood education — on the basis that the quality of a child's experience is inseparable from the quality of support given to the adult in the room with them.

A mother to two teenage boys herself, Mel brings a parent's perspective to the way Little Scholars campuses are run — understanding that families are managing far more than a drop-off and a pick-up, and that a service should be making their week easier.

She works with families, educators and leadership teams to create safe, welcoming and playful learning environments, because that is what gives children the best possible place to learn.