Celebrating their recent Grand Opening, Parkland Children’s Academy is modeled after the owner’s successful Coconut Creek school, Providence Children’s Academy, which began three years ago. Their newest preschool is a brand new facility nestled in a quiet setting at the heart of Parkland. Director Donna Morgan and her husband, Tom, are excited to bring their brand of education to our community. Tom says, “In both of our schools, we focus on safety and education. We are a school, not a daycare.”
Security/safety measures include: Fingerprint ID for child pick up, web cams in the classrooms and play yard to enable parents to watch from anywhere they have a computer, iPhone, etc, and the 5,000 square foot facility has mirrored tint on all of the outside windows to ensure privacy for the students.
Students can be enrolled from age 1 through VPK. The curriculum, Tom says, is based on the principle, “Children learn when they have fun.” Each of the classrooms include a variety of interactive centers. There is a science center, a blocks center, a dramatic play center, a reading center and more. The children will go from center to center to get each experience, learning a variety of developmental lessons in the course of each day.
All teachers at Parkland Children’s Academy are fully certified and experienced. Tom says, “You can be a professor in college and not be able to teach in a pre school. You have to have to be certified in early childhood education, and each of our teachers is.”
A beautifully shaded and spacious outdoor play area is a terrific spot for outside activities. With a 6-foot privacy fence, parents can be assured that safety is, again, priority number one. The surface is a specially designed turf. “The company that put it in has done 17 NFL stadiums,” Tom tells us confidently. “If it’s good for the boys in the NFL, its good for our kids.”
When asked what sets Parkland Children’s Academy apart from other preschools, one focus of our discussion turns to discipline. Tom and the staff are passionate about inclusion, rather than exclusion. He says, “We don’t believe in time out, we believe in redirection. Let’s just say Billy is not happy in the block area and is fussing. Rather than putting him in time out where all the children see that Billy was a ‘bad boy,’ the teachers will move him to a different center.” Tom, Donna and their staff are disheartened by daycare facilities that display happy or sad faces next to a child’s name, showing all of the other kids who’s been bad. “We don’t believe in that,” Tom says adamantly. “We do, however, believe in a reward system!” So when Billy has a good day, he’ll get a sticker or some other reward that keeps him feeling confident and good about his schoolday.
In conclusion, Tom and Donna’s passion is to bless our community with a model that has been running smoothly for several years in the town next door. “We realized that we’ve made such a significant difference in the families and the children at the Coconut Creek school, and parents tell us over and over again that we’re just the best in the area. We thought, ‘Let’s do it again in Parkland!'”
Take a tour of the new state of the art Parkland Children’s Academy, and find out about their partnership with the YMCA, catered lunches, their summer camp and much more!
For more info please call: 954-570-6914
or visit www.ParklandChildrensAcademy.com
