PORTLAND, Ore.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Children’s Creative Learning Centers (CCLC®), a nationwide child care provider dedicated to quality employer-sponsored early childhood education, announced today that 100 percent of its centers have been certified as Eco-Healthy Child Care Centers by the Oregon Environmental Council (OEC). This recognition reflects the commitment of CCLC and its clients to creating healthy, high-quality educational environments for the children and communities they serve.
Eco-healthy certification plays a critical role in CCLC’s commitment to creative, inspired and quality child care solutions for employers. In coordination with a robust endorsement checklist, eco-healthy certification recognizes each of CCLC’s 109 centers as safe and healthy environments for children, with reduced exposure to toxins, such as lead, mercury and certain plastics, in and around the facilities.
The importance of teaching children at an early age the benefits of sustainable practices is echoed by the General Services Administration in San Francisco (GSA), which partners with CCLC to run the Kids By the Bay Child Development Center (KBTB). “The KBTB Child Development Center Advisory Board is grateful for the hard work and sustainable endeavors that CCLC has implemented on behalf of the children at all of its centers,” said Danielle Bogni, Acting Board President and GSA Environmental Protection Specialist. “Reducing one’s footprint in society is no longer reserved for the typical American family; it must be taught at the earliest stages in a society’s development. CCLC realizes that their level of stewardship will directly affect how the children at KBTB treat their environment. They may walk softly but their actions have a resounding affect and should be emulated nationwide.”
“I am awed by the vision and passion of CCLC’s clients in making eco-healthy a priority for their employees and their children,” said Fran Durekas, Founder and Chief Development Officer for CCLC. “This distinction from the OEC mirrors CCLC’s own company values and dedication to providing high-quality early childhood education to the children in our care. Together, we work for the day when eco-healthy certification is the norm among our country’s child care centers.”
Along with following eco-healthy operational practices, CCLC also integrates green initiatives into classroom curriculum and center construction. For example, at the Center for Children and Families at CSU San Marcos, children tend a garden, growing vegetables for harvest and use in the center’s kid’s kitchen. At other centers, classrooms manage recycling centers, use recycled materials in art projects and host battery recycling collection drives for local communities. And, CCLC has worked with several clients to design and construct child care facilities that meet green construction and LEED® certification (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) requirements. Opened in January 2009, the Paramount Child Development Center in Avenal, California, is one of the first LEED Platinum certified and fully sustainable child care facilities in the nation.
Photo by Micah Sittig
