{"id":12179,"date":"2014-05-22T10:00:46","date_gmt":"2014-05-22T14:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/?p=12179"},"modified":"2014-05-21T15:33:28","modified_gmt":"2014-05-21T19:33:28","slug":"tick-tock-celebrating-50-years-of-learning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/?p=12179","title":{"rendered":"Tick Tock celebrating 50 years of learning"},"content":{"rendered":"

Still filling large need for pre- and after-school care<\/b><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

By Gretchen Parisi<\/strong>, Special to The Times<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Playground<\/a>

Two very happy youngsters enjoy quality time on the slide at Tick Tock Early Learning Center, which is celebrating its 50th Anniversary with a special event, May 31 \u2014 the Party In The Preserve \u2014 at ChesLen Preserve.<\/p><\/div>\n

In 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson declared a \u201cwar on poverty,\u201d the St. Louis Cardinals beat the New York Yankees 4-3 in the World Series, Mary Poppins<\/i> was in movie theaters and “Beatlemania” was taking over the nation. Locally, 1964 also marked the opening of the Tick Tock Early Learning Center in Avondale, which is celebrating its 50th<\/sup> year of providing affordable, reliable child care and quality early childhood education for the children of low-income workers in Southern Chester County.<\/p>\n

The idea for Tick Tock began when the Race Relations Committee of the Kennett Friends Meeting voiced concerns that some of the area\u2019s disadvantaged students were struggling in school. The Committee recognized the need for educational outreach before children reached kindergarten, so with little fanfare and a great number of dedicated volunteers, Tick Tock soon was founded and moved into its home in the former Tic Toc Bar in Toughkenamon. It has been evolving and expanding ever since.<\/p>\n

\"Old<\/a>

The Tick Tock Early Learning Center started out in 1964 in the former Tic Toc Bar in Toughkenamon. 50 years later, the program has grown and expanded, but never drifted too far from its essential mission: to provide early learning education for children, many of whom have come from low-income families, with few if any other options.<\/p><\/div>\n

Today, Tick Tock is a private, nonprofit corporation that serves children ages 18 months through 7th<\/sup> grade, including before and after-school care for school-age children. In addition to preparing preschoolers to succeed in kindergarten and beyond, Tick Tock helps low-income working families receive quality child care at rates they can afford. The current cost for full-time care ranges from $84 to $214 per week, based on a sliding scale, Tick Tock Executive Director Jackie Maas explained. \u201cThe scale is based on the income in the home and the number of people in the home, which addresses the reality of the family situation,\u201d she said. \u201cAll of our parents work and all of our parents pay.\u201d<\/p>\n

With its student body near maximum capacity (105 students) and dozens more children on a waiting list, it is clear that Tick Tock fills a burgeoning need in the community. \u201cI am grateful for the forward-minded women who started Tick Tock knowing that if families were going to set down roots in this area, mothers would need support in caring for their children while contributing to their family\u2019s income,\u201d said Marianne Maye, president of the Tick Tock volunteer Board of Directors.<\/p>\n

Tick Tock maintains its original mission but has modified program to accommodate area families\u2019 needs. When the demographics of the Center moved from largely African American to Latino, Tick Tock\u2019s leadership embraced the change. \u201cWe have been flexible and responsive to the community over the years,\u201d Maas said. \u201cAt first all of the students spoke English, but as our population evolved into a primarily Spanish-speaking one, we\u2019ve added bilingual staff, now provide certified interpretation in parent meetings, and have invested in bilingual educational materials.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"New-Building\"<\/a>

The Tick Tock Early Learning Center as it appears today.<\/p><\/div>\n

Pedro Cruz, a teacher at Tick Tock since 1975, was the first bilingual teacher hired. \u201cThere has been a lot of change over the years \u2013 in the beginning we were in a small building with no computers, and now we have a larger building with more modern educational tools,\u201d Cruz said. He noted that although the specifics of the Center\u2019s operations have changed, the Center\u2019s goal has remained the same \u2013 getting children ready for academic success. \u201cChildren are more comfortable when they go to school because they are prepared,\u201d Cruz said.<\/p>\n

Tick Tock is not only a \u201csafe place for kids to be\u201d \u2013 it also creates \u201ca sense of community and belonging for the kids and parents,\u201d according to Rosa Quintana, a former Tick Tock parent, as well as a former Tick Tock employee. \u201cI appreciated the fact that it was a bilingual child care with a focus on education,\u201d Quintana said. \u201cEveryone was always friendly, welcoming and open to any parent concerns,\u201d she added. Quintana, who now holds a master\u2019s degree in social services and law and policy, is an active member of the Tick Tock Board of Directors, \u201cbecause I wanted to give back what I was given.\u201d<\/p>\n

Maye remarked that Tick Tock\u2019s English-immersion approach, \u201cas well as the acceptance of all cultures, personalities, backgrounds and practices, is woven into daily practice in the way I believe it should be in the larger community. These children are learning to be responsible community members who value education.\u201d<\/p>\n

At present, Tick Tock has many accomplishments to celebrate. These include:<\/p>\n

\u2022 Raising the funds to buy its building several decades ago;
\n\u2022 Making investments in staff, many of whom have worked for Tick Tock for more than five years (standard industry turnover rate is 30 percent);
\n\u2022 Encouraging volunteers, from youth groups to high school students to adults, to contribute to Tick Tock\u2019s mission and success;
\n\u2022 Advocating for children, early childhood education and family issues at the local and state levels;
\n\u2022 Earning a STAR 4, the highest rating awarded by the Pennsylvania Keystone STARS Quality Child Care Assurance Initiative; and
\n\u2022 Building a new, state-of-the-art outdoor learning space.<\/p>\n

Next on Tick Tock\u2019s wish list are a kitchen renovation (the kitchen was last renovated when the Center served only 50 kids) and a building expansion to better serve the existing students.<\/p>\n

To celebrate Tick Tock\u2019s 50th<\/sup> birthday and help raise funds for upcoming projects, on May 31 the organization is hosting a \u201cParty in the Preserve,\u201d a casual celebration at the Natural Lands Trusts\u2019 ChesLen Preserve from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. Tickets are $75 per person or $125 per couple. For additional information, please call (610) 268-8134.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Still filling large need for pre- and after-school care By Gretchen Parisi, Special to The Times In 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson declared a \u201cwar on poverty,\u201d the St. Louis Cardinals beat the New York Yankees 4-3 in the World Series, Mary Poppins was in movie theaters and “Beatlemania” was taking over the nation. Locally, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12176,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,4],"tags":[4676,4678,4679,4677,1590,543],"class_list":["post-12179","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","category-featured","tag-4676","tag-after-school","tag-celebration","tag-pre-school","tag-tick-tock-early-learning-center","tag-toughkenamon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12179"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12179\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kennetttimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}