Strausstown will soon be adding a daycare to its businesses as Little Sprouts Daycare LLC is very close to opening right on Main Street.
Little Sprouts Daycare is a state licensed child care center with an educational curriculum that covers age appropriate science, math, social studies, literacy, art and much more taught by its staff.
Jessica Schaeffer, of Bethel, is seeing her dream just one step away from being achieved as she opens her very own daycare.
‘It’s a fun job. It’s never the same thing,’ said Schaeffer.
Having passed all of the borough inspections, Schaeffer and her center are just awaiting the license from the Department of Public Welfare which was sent out in the mail last week giving the DPW 30 days to respond.
‘That was my dream,’ said Schaeffer. ‘Probably even during high school I wanted to someday open my own daycare.’
Schaeffer, who has a degree in early education and has also worked at a larger daycare, happened upon and old doctor’s office in Strausstown that offers a spot with the address right on Main Street, but also provides a parking lot with the building sitting back from the street providing extra safety for the children in the daycare. One of the other reasons that Schaeffer decided to open her own daycare was that she is at full capacity currently in her home with the children she cares for during the day and is often asked if she would be able to take care of more.
‘I always wanted to start in my home,’ she said. ‘I wanted to start small. Then I started getting more requests, but I was full.’
Before starting on the daycare, Schaeffer wanted to see if others felt that there would be a need for a daycare in the Strausstown area. She sent home surveys with area schools and based on the responses felt that it was a good decision to go about making her dream come true.
‘We’ll try it,’ she said as she recalled reading the results of the survey.
The project began in February and Schaeffer held an open house on Saturday, April 26, to give parents a chance to see the remodeled doctor’s office. Walking into the center is the kitchen area which also has the necessary paper work displayed and a lunch menu. Schaeffer’s office is also located at the entrance. In order to get back to the rooms where the children will be set up, guests will need to enter a code into the electronic keypad (or teachers at the daycare will need to grant entrance) at the door to the hallway. There are three rooms from the hallway which are color coded and labeled for infants, toddlers and pre-school. Currently, Schaeffer has a pre-school and a toddle teacher ready to go as soon as the center is officially opened as well as a teacher hired to run the summer camp. There is an outside, fenced in playground set up as well.
Due to the size of the location, the center will most likely hold around 17 children which is more than okay with Schaeffer.
‘I wanted it to be cozy,’ she said. ‘They will get to know the other kids and teachers better this way.’
The center is still open for enrollment and is accepting children from six weeks to five years old. Before and after school care is also available as well as summer programs. Little Sprouts Daycare is located at 87 Main Street in Strausstown.
Though she is currently waiting to hear back from the DPW to be able to officially open, Schaeffer continues to find last minute things to add and is waiting as patiently as possible for the center to open.
For more information on Little Sprouts Daycare, visit https://www.facebook.com/Littlesproutsdayc.
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