Dawn Medina said she got a good idea of how kids work through the Maplewood School District when she was on MRH School Board. Now she’s opening her own childcare center in Maplewood, which focuses on preparing them for school.
“It would be so phenomenal if we could start educating these kids when they’re small — very small,” Medina said. “Have some kind of developmental review to see where they are before they enter ECC. So I went on a quest to see how to do that.”
Parents as Teachers will visit Medina’s New Destiny Childcare Center, at 3732 Cambridge Avenue, in Maplewood, for monthly developmental reviews — looking for any issues to be worked on as early as possible.
“That way, before they begin ECC, some of these things are diagnosed or brought to our attention, and we at the center can work on those things. Speech therapist or whatever it is,” she said. “Every kid will be individualized. We will do group activities, but if there is a child who is delayed we can focus on that.”
Teacher, Aaron Collins, said when the kids transition to ECC they’ll be ready to go. “Our goal is for them to be advanced. We have high expectations for the kids,” he said.
Medina said the teachers are degreed and qualified. “We want the teachers to stay for a long time. We’ve pretty much done everything as top of the line as we could,” she said. She said the student teacher is 1-4 when all the staff is there. Other times it will be 1-7.
She said the center’s director, Dr. Lois Truman, has opened up daycare centers all over the world. The last one was in Dubai.
Medina has signed a lease-to-own on the house, so in one year she’ll be buying it, she said.
So thrilled to see a quality site for infants, too! I commend Dawn Medina for her vision!
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