Day Nursery students help tackle hunger in Indy

Federal Center

Congratulations to the staff and families of the seven Day Nursery early childhood centers and our administrative staff for helping to Tackle Hunger in the Indianapolis area as part of the national Souper Bowl of Caring annual event.  As a group,  Day Nursery made this contribution:

• Total food donated: 559 items
• Total money donated: $340.59

Here’s a recap of our success story center by center. The Day Nursery Federal Center downtown selected their Pennsylvania Street neighbor, The Metro Baptist Center food pantry to support.  In a typical month, this pantry serves 400-500 people.  Federal Center Director Sarah Parks reports her center  collected 118 items and $32 to help them out.

Ft. Harrison Day Nursery

Our Start Smart 4 Children Day Nursery at Ft. Harrison split their collections between the Damien Center on North Arsenal and The New Haven Missionary Baptist Church food pantry.  The center collected 100 food items and $19.22 in cash. Ft. Harrison Center Director Debra Ballard and her head cook Beverly Croom are pictured here getting ready to wheel the donation out to the car.

Day Nursery Hendricks County

The Day Nursery Hendricks County Center collected 73 food items and $31.50 for the Messiah Lutheran Church in Brownsburg. The MLC Food Pantry exists to provide food for families and individuals in Hendricks County who are experiencing temporary financial hardship.

Day Nursery IU Health

The Day Nursery IU Health Center was collecting for Dayspring Center at the corner of 16th and Central Avenue.  Day Nursery Director of Curriculum, Jesse McCloud, who is based out of our IU Health Center knows the Dayspring Center very well because her late mother used to run the food program there. Dayspring provides emergency shelter, clothing, and three nourishing meals-a-day for homeless families with children in central Indiana. The IU Health center collected 34 cans of fruit and vegetables and $143.69 in money for Dayspring. Pictured above, Jesse McCloud joins  Rene Withers of Day Nursery to make the presentation to Dayspring Center Executive Director Lori Casson.

Northwest Center

The Day Nursery Northwest Center chose to do their Souper Bowl of Caring collection for their Pike Township neighbors at the Fay Biccard Glick Center at Crooked Creek,2990 West 71st Street. They collected $81.23 in funds and 20 different non-perishable items.  Ms. Rene’s class, pictured here, collected the largest amount of money and food.  The classroom won a pizza party and Ms. Rene won a Souper Bowl of Caring t-shirt.

Lilly Center

The Day Nursery Ruth A. Lilly Center was so close to the beneficiary of their Souper Bowl of Caring collection that the Pre-K class took the donations over to them in wagons. The students collected 100 food items for donations to the Tabernacle Presbyterian Church,418 East 34th Street. TAB serves meals to their neighbors every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. More than 800 people come through our doors each month for a hot lunch and food to take home to families.

State Center

The staff and families of the Day Nursery Indiana State Government Center chose to collect for the Northside New Era Baptist Church Feed the Sheep program where Day Nursery teacher Debbie Beatty is a volunteer.  The food pantry served over 1400 families last year and is open twice a week. The center collected$32.95 cash and 74 food items.

Day Nursery Human Resources Director Cathy Johnson

Finally, the staff of the Day Nursery Administration office in the English Foundation Building chose to collect food for the Ronald McDonald House to honor our co-worker Marsha Hearn Lindsey, Day Nursery Chief Operating Officer, who is retiring from a position on the RMH Board of Directors.  Food collected will help restock the pantry at the Ronald McDonald House allowing families to prepare meals at the house so they can stay close to their child being treated at Riley Hospital.  We collected 40 non perishable items and also donated fresh fruit and eggs for their kitchen.

Mind In the Making

If you didn’t get a chance to join us Thursday night to hear Ellen Galinsky

We had a great turnout of Day Nursery parents

Teacher Nelia Raine of the Day Nursery IU Health Center gets her copy of Mind In The Making autographed after the talk.

Day Nursery Director of Curriculum Jesse McCloud shares a story with Ellen after the event.

speak about her new book, Mind in the Making: The Seven Essential Life Skills Every Child Needs, I would encourage you to visit her website and sign up for The Daily Child.  Her short emails are packed full of great ideas for interactions you can start with your child today on your drive home.  Here’s an example:

Play Games That Ask Children to Find Their Way in Spaces

When you are driving somewhere, have older children help track where you are going either by using a map or, if you have one, by a GPS system. With younger children, you can narrate your navigation: “Now we’ll drive down this street until we see your preschool on the left, and we’ll turn left into the parking lot. That will be in one, two, three blocks.”

Visit the Mind in the Making website today to sign up.

Thanks Evelyn Croom for 22 years of service to Day Nursery

Last Friday evening, friends and family of Day Nursery Clarian Center cook Evelyn Croom gathered at the center for a retirement party.  During her 22 years of working for Day Nursery Evelyn worked at four locations including our (now closed) Northside and Wiles Centers, as well as our Ruth A. Lilly Center and our Clarian Center where she finished her tour of duty.  As you can see by these photos, Ms. Croom loves the color purple so Day Nursery Director of Curriculum Jesse McCloud, a long time friend of Evelyn’s,  decorated everything she could find with the color–including the cake (which, thank goodness, Ms. Croom didn’t have to bake for herself!). The guests went around the room sharing special memories of Evelyn.  Day Nursery Clarian Center Director Rene Withers said among other things, she will miss the potatoes and onions Ms. Croom used to make for the staff as a special breakfast treat.   Day Nursery Executive Director Carolyn Dederer presented her with a rolling suitcase and best wishes for many happy travels in her retirement.

Thanksgiving Family Lunch November 2009 at the Day Nursery Clarian Center: (L to R) Evelyn Croom, Dollie Smith, Jesse McCloud, Rene Withers

Day Nursery in the news

Thanks to the recent Day Nursery Auxiliary fashion show, a donation to The Children’s Museum and today’s statewide rollout of the Paths to Quality child care rating system signage at child care centers, Day Nursery has had a few great opportunities to share our story in the news recently.  As you might have read here earlier, last Wednesday I was on Fox59 with our Style Show commentator (and Day Nursery graduate) Danielle Smith and models from The Helen Wells Agency promoting our fashion show. 

While we were live on Fox 59, children from the Day Nursery Northwest Center were heading to The Children’s Museum for a field trip compliments of PNC.  The financial institution was announcing a three-year donation to the museum to improve the popular  Playscapes area and wanted to make sure they had a full house of preschoolers to celebrate the announcement.  Although there was not a picture of our children in the story which appeared on Indystar.com, three of the four children pictured in the print version of the newspaper (see at left) were identified as Day Nursery students.

Yesterday, Day Nursery Executive Director Carolyn Dederer was interviewed by WRTV6 (ABC) reporter Myrt Price at our Indiana State Government Center because Day Nursery centers are participating the new voluntary statewide quality rating system, Paths to Quality.

If you missed the news story, you can watch it here.

This morning, the staff of Child Care Answers, the community outreach arm of Day Nursery, hosted one of 11 simultaneous press conferences across our state to announce the latest rollout of Indiana’s statewide child care quality rating system Paths to QUALITY.  Fox 59 covered the press conference so look for the story on their news tonight.   Day Nursery is very excited that six of our seven child care centers have been named Paths to Quality Level 4 (the highest level!) centers.  Our seventh center, the Day Nursery located on 3522 N. Central is a Level 3 and we anticipate it moving up to Level 4 when the center achieves national accreditation through NAEYC.  We are excited about this statewide push for quality child care and look forward to attracting more students because of our high ratings.

Day Nursery Clarian Center Directors Jesse McCloud (left) and Rene Withers show off their new Paths to Quality Level 4 banner.

(L to R) Marsha Thompson, IACCRRA; Mindy Bennett, Child Care Answers and Melanie Brizzi, Indiana Bureau of Child Care

Mindy Bennett Child Care Answers was interviewed by Fox 59

Douglas S. Hairston of the City of Indianapolis Front Porch Alliance is interviewed by the Paths to Quality video crew for future promotional materials.

Day Nursery staff celebrates 30 years of service

Taylor

McCloud

Williams

I don’t know what was in the water in

Day Nursey flashback: Jackie Williams receives her CDA certification

 30 years ago this week, but whatever it was, Day Nursery is grateful for it.  This week three of our staff members celebrated 30 years of employment with Day Nursery. Congratulations to Jesse McCloud, Director of Curriculum at the Day Nursery Clarian Center; Jackie Williams, Assistant Center Director at the Day Nursery Hendricks County Center in Avon and Diane Taylor, preschool teacher at the Day Nursery Federal Center downtown.  They all started as teachers on the same day at our old Medical Center branch at Wishard Hospital.  We salute this great group of Day Nursery dedicated staff.

A little snow doesn’t slow us down!

Day Nursery center directors are a pretty fearless bunch.  Today’s snow didn’t stop them from gathering this morning at the Day Nursery Ruth A. Lilly Center on Central Avenue for their weekly get together to talk about our national accreditation standards.  When I put out an email this morning requesting a picture of Day Nursery children playing in the snow, this is what they sent me.  Yes, we are all kids at heart!  Left to right: Jesse McCloud, Clarian Center; Deanna Saylor, State Center; Joy McCall, Avon Center; Debra Ballard, Ft. Harrison Center and Marla Segal, Northwest Center.  Thanks to Day Nursery Lilly Center teacher Eva Johnson for snapping the picture.

Day Nursery teachers are life-long learners

Day Nursery State Center Director Deanna Saylor (left) and Clarian Center Director Jesse McCloud (in red) talk to Jungle John and his feathered friend Whoo-sier about his comapny Silly Safaris during the IAEYC conference last year.

Over 100 Day Nurseryteachers and center administrators will be downtown at the Indiana Convention Center early Saturday to attend  Indiana Early Childhood Conference presented by the Indiana Association for the Education of Young Children (IAEYC).  The Indiana Early Childhood Conference is the largest conference in Indiana geared toward early childhood professionals and parents of children birth through eight years of age. It features more than 200 workshops presented by early childhood professionals from across the nation. The Indiana AEYC state conference allows people in the early childhood field to network with other professionals as well as gain resources they can utilize each day to increase the quality of care and education that young children receive. The exhibit hall is always filled with the latest products and teaching tools for sale. The conference serves public and private school teachers, early childhood professionals and parents. Approximately 3,700 people attend the state conference each year.  Our Day Nursery contingent is usually the largest group registered from any one organization each year.  It is not too late to attend.  You can register on-site this weekend.  Stop by the Day Nursery booth and say hello.

Day Nursery families reach out to Julian Center

(left to right) Rene Withers, Center Director with Center Director of Curriculum, Jesse McCloud

Our staff and families at the Day Nursery Clarian Center have chosen to reach out to those in need at the Julian Center again this holiday season.  Tammia Belin, lead teacher in one of the two year old classrooms organized a successful holiday drive last year and has seen a great response again this year from parents. Last night when I was visiting the center, I noticed boxes outside of each classroom filled with food, pantry supplies, warm blankets, hats and gloves. Center Director Rene Withers said that each classroom has been collecting items for a few weeks and the donations are scheduled to be delivered on Friday.  Thanks to all the Day Nursery families for their generous response!