CCC’s New Mission and Guiding Principles

Dear Parents and Staff:

We are pleased to announce that the CCC has a new Mission and set of Guiding Principles. With a near unanimous result, over 90% of our CCC community selected as our new mission:

To Nurture the natural curiosity of children as a foundation for life-long learning.

And, based on the input and voting from all of you, we have also selected five Guiding Principles to accompany the Mission:

  • Encourage critical thinking by incorporating STEM into everyday play.
  • Trust that children are active participants in the learning process.
  • Respect and care for each other and our surroundings.
  • Value diversity and inclusiveness.
  • Establish a happy environment that fosters creativity.

On behalf of the Board of Trustees and the Mission Revision Project Committee, I would like to thank everyone who helped guide, and provided input to, this important project. The feedback we received from all the Parents and Staff was critical in understanding what is important to our community and therefore what our Mission should be.

Warmly,
The CCC Staff &
Jim Franke
CCC Board of Trustees
Facilitator for the Mission Revision Project

Staff Transitions

June 26th, 2017

Dear CCC Families,

Summertime is a period of transition for the children, but is also a time of transition for our staff as well. Here are some announcements we would like to share with you:

Monica Dolan has accepted a position as our new STEM curriculum coordinator. We are very excited to have her join the administration team and support the STEM curriculum development in our program.

Olivia Garcia will be stepping in to take Monica’s place as the lead teacher in the Raccoon room. She is happy to continue with her former Koalas for another year together as Raccoons.

Janet Nunez will be taking Olivia’s place as lead teacher in the Koalas. She too is excited to have her former Penguins as Koalas and is looking forward to being on the preschool team. Juliana Escudero will be joining her in the Koalas as well, creating a familiar face for the children and the team.

Shain Yann Hsu will be saying goodbye to us this summer. We wish her the best in her future endeavors. Joining the Beavers in her place will be Carla Towns. Carla has been working in the Koalas and will find a few familiar “hop-skippers” in the Beavers.

Melissa Samples will be returning to the Penguins, this time as a lead teacher in Janet’s place. She is excited to return to familiar friends as a lead and learn all things Penguin! Jessica Lockridge will remain a penguin teacher, though she will be joining Melissa’s new team.

Kayla Chambers has accepted a position as lead teacher in the Bunny room and will be stepping in place for Melissa. Kayla will be a welcome addition to the bunny rooms!

The administration is working to hire two additional staff members for the infant toddler classrooms. Stay tuned!

Change can be difficult, so each teacher will visit for an hour or two gradually building up to a day. This will allow the children to bond and the teachers to get to know the personalities in each room. We should be settled by July 5th. We are confident that our staff is well prepared to support the children, parents and each other to ensure these transitions are successful.

Please let us know if you have any questions.

Sincerely,

The CCC Administrative Staff

The Children’s Center at Caltech Earns National NAEYC Accreditation

The Children’s Center at Caltech (CCC) has earned accreditation from the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC)—the world’s largest organization working on behalf of young children.

NAEYC Accreditation is a rigorous and transformative quality-improvement system that uses a set of 10 research-based standards to collaborate with early education programs to recognize and drive quality-improvement in high-quality early learning environments.

To earn NAEYC Accreditation, the CCC went through an extensive self-study and quality-improvement process, followed by an on-site visit by NAEYC Assessors to verify and ensure that the program met each of the ten program standards, and hundreds of corresponding individual criteria. NAEYC-accredited programs are always prepared for unannounced quality-assurance visits during their accreditation term, which lasts for five years.

In the 30 years since NAEYC Accreditation was established, it has become a widely recognized sign of high-quality early childhood education. More than 7,000 programs are currently accredited by NAEYC—less than 10 percent of all child care centers, preschools, and kindergartens nationally achieve this recognition.

“NAEYC-Accredited programs bring our definitions of excellence for early childhood education to life each day,” said Kristen Johnson, senior director of Early Learning Program Accreditation at NAEYC. “Earning NAEYC Accreditation makes the CCC an exemplar of good practice for families and the entire community.”

For more information about NAEYC Accreditation, visit the NAEYC website.