The hallways are unheated, and two of the playgrounds are not yet built, but fresh finger-paintings already decorate the classroom walls of the newly opened Moss Street Children’s Center.
The new center, a culmination of the University Child Care and Development Center’s programs, opened five of its classrooms Jan. 5 after about two years of planning and development, CCDC Child Care Coordinator Dennis Reynolds said.
“It’s just cool,” he said. “It’s beautiful, and it works.”
The center provides child care services mainly to University students, as well as some faculty, staff and community members.
Reynolds said he has been dreaming of a center like this since he submitted his first proposal to the University in 1988.
“A generation or two of kids later, we got a new building,” he said.
Construction at the center is expected to be completed in February, and more programs will be added in the summer. The nearly $3 million building, which was funded by student building fees, will eventually operate eight classrooms and accommodate about 120 children, Reynolds said.
He said the center brings together child-care programs that were located in the EMU with programs based in three facilities located on Moss Street, which were used as temporary facilities for the past 30 years.
He added that the center is the first project to be developed in the East Campus area. The center complies with the University’s sustainability project and is equipped with “lots of energy-management things,” he said. He added that the building’s energy use is 40 percent below city code limits, in part because of motion detecting lights and underground pipes for the heating and cooling system.
The building is also designed to sustain plant life on the site.
Original concerns about the fate of a 40-year-old water oak in the middle of the site and a pine tree on one corner were put to rest by constructing the building around the two trees and their root systems.
“Those historic trees are still here and will be for a long time to come,” Reynolds said.
EMU Director of Student Activities Gregg Lobisser said the way the building wraps around the center courtyard, where the oak tree and the playgrounds are located, creates a sense of community.
“This is an exciting high-quality facility that provides just a first-rate environment for children,” he said.
Reynolds said the building blends in well with the neighborhood, which was a concern for some residents in the area. He said one aspect that makes it appropriate for the area is the roofs are not higher than the nearby houses.
“It’s a little school, and it’s consistent with the neighborhood,” he said. “It doesn’t feel like an institutional building; it feels really warm.”
Lobisser said he has received no recent complaints from neighbors about the building.
“I have heard nothing but compliments in the last few months,” he said.
Mary McAllister, a lead teacher at the center, said she will miss the “hominess” of the previous house on Moss Street where she taught, but this building has many more advantages.
“I love it here,” she said. “It’s bright. It’s airy. I can see all of the kids all the time. Everyone’s just full of smiles here.”
University junior Rachael Latimer agreed the building has more advantages than the previous facilities, and her 3-year-old son enjoys going to the school.
“It’s a really good improvement,” she said. “There are a lot of features that are custom for kids.”
University staff member Debbie Doran said her 6-year-old daughter has adapted well to the new center.
“She just got in here, decorated her cubby, and she’s on her way,” she said.