LONG BEACH DAY NURSERY 1548 Chestnut Ave.
Long Beach, California 90813
Tel: (562) 591-0509
www.lbdn.org
Patrice Wong, Executive Director
The Long Beach Day Nursery, founded in 1912, provides affordable quality early care and education for young children of working parents, from six weeks to six years of age. LBDN is dedicated to the belief that a good start in the formative years of childhood provides children with a lasting foundation for success throughout their lives. The overarching goal is that every child who graduates from the preschool has all the skills necessary to successfully transition to kindergarten. The resulting outcome is each child is fully prepared intellectually, emotionally, socially and physically to compete on a level playing field with his/her peers.
The Atlas Family Foundation provides funding for the Early Intervention Program as well as Professional Development.
The Early Intervention Program provides early intervention and parent education resources for families with special needs children. These children are identified as those who demonstrate limited language skills, learning disabilities, health issues, mild to moderate developmental delays, problems with attention and focus, speech impairment, and social, behavioral or family dysfunction. On-site intervention specialists coordinate all EIP activities to ensure an integrated and holistic approach.
When a child exhibits behavioral or developmental problems, EIP ensures that everyone involved - parents, teachers, the child, as appropriate, and LBDN's child psychologist - is engaged in communications to ensure that appropriate intervention strategies are developed and implemented. This collaborative approach is critical to the successful outcome of intervention strategies, as it facilitates consistency, family involvement, and positive parenting. Parents and families may be referred to additional community services or to other specialists, if the need is warranted. Furthermore, when possible and with the written permission of the parents, staff makes contact and works in cooperation with other agencies in which the child and family are involved. This ensures a comprehensive focus on what is best for the child and amplifies the potential of all programs.
The Professional Development Program encourages teachers, through formal incentives, to take advantage of teacher workshops and trainings throughout the year. This program helps teachers remain abreast of current trends in early care and education. Scholarships and other financial aid are available as well as three annual in-service staff development days.
The Professional Development Program component of the TAFF grant will enable LBDN to train all of the teaching staff in Conscious Discipline practices which is a comprehensive emotional intelligence and classroom management system that integrates all domains of learning (social, emotional, physical, cultural and cognitive) into one seamless curriculum. The program director and both center directors will complete the training during the first year and agency-wide implementation will be completed in year two. The grant will also provide 2-3 in-services/workshops facilitated by the Pediatric Therapy Network Staff and would pay for 15 staff (12 head teachers plus the program director and both center directors) to attend the National Association for the Education of Young Children conference.
Recent AFF grants:
$47,160, November 2010
