Troy University’s Coleman Center receives grant from ADECE
Troy University’s Coleman Center is receiving a large grant from the Alabama Department of Early Childhood Education. The grant is from the preschool development grant fund, to excel the center’s mission.
DOTHAN, Ala. (WTVY) – The Coleman Center provides education for children from the ages of six weeks to five years old. Director Nanny Mitta said the program sets a foundation for these children.
“There is a couple of benefits to the program that are very important for quality for early childhood,” Mitta said. “Those are going to be lower staff child ratios. Teachers will have the opportunity to increase and improve their credentials, their education credentials. We’ll have developmentally appropriate and very high quality equipment, we’ll have ongoing assessment and curriculum and we will also have a family engagement aspect where our families will be involved and we’ll provide support and resources for them as well.”
The Coleman Center’s mission is to provide lifelong success for students in and outside of the classroom. Their mission will excel thanks to receiving a federal grant from the Alabama Department of Early Childhood Education that is over half a million dollars.
“We are just very honored and thankful to have the Coleman Center here in the Wiregrass, and we’re thankful for the grants to make Coleman Center a model for the Wiregrass,” Mitta said.
Mitta said this initiative is motivated by recent research finding that the brain is 95 percent developed by the age of five.
This $596,000 grant will begin September 1st, which puts the facility now in the planning stages.
“We are all in the process of positions posted and working on budgets,” Mitta said.
Mitta said the staff is looking forward to assistance in the classroom. With that additional support comes additional criteria the facility will have to meet.
“It’s exciting because it challenges our teachers in not only things they will have to be implemented in the classroom that are new that improve quality, but also they will be able to improve their quality of performance by increasing educational credentials, professional development training, they’ll have lots of new resources, high quality, developmental appropriate resources,” Mitta said.
Mitta said grants from the ADECE are important to the facility and allows them to continue educating Pre-K children.
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https://www.wtvy.com/2020/08/21/troy-universitys-coleman-center-receives-grant-from-adece/