Kid's Club on Phillips Street comes alive during after school hours, offering extended day coverage until 6 p.m. for working parents with young children attending Andover Public Schools.
But the nonprofit and its parent, Shawsheen Extended Day (SHED), with the great location in the shadow of Phillips Academy, has always been quiet during school hours. No longer.
Call it a preschool invasion. The 3- to 5-year-old crowd has arrived, as a program just for them has started. Next fall, SHED will launch a full preschool program.
"We have this great big building and we want to be more community-oriented - not just known for our after school programs," said Dina Hurley, Kid's Club director.
The new program that launched this month is called Little Explorers At Play, or LEAP. Two five-week courses are offered as well as many one-day special workshops, like a 45-minute painting class. Parents stay and are welcome to enjoy coffee and treats.
"They can socialize, so this is good for parents, too," Hurley said.
LEAP is the first step in making the Kid's Club building more useful.
"We are hoping to expand so that we can service the community more fully than just our after school programming. We
would love to be more of a community center for families," Hurley said.
The preschool program will launch in the fall. Hurley said she just received word that the new morning preschool has been approved. The preschool will be called Monarch PreSchool at SHED. Teachers have not yet been hired but Kid's Club expects to announce its plans in the spring, Hurley said.
"Younger kids bring so much light and sparkle," Hurley said. "We are very excited about our new programs."
According to the organization's website, "Monarch's philosophy is influenced and inspired by the Multiple Intelligences theory of Howard Gardner, the project approach to learning and by the educators of the world-renowned, Italian Reggio Emilia preschool program."
The Shawsheen Extended Day (SHED) started in 1984 with 18 kindergarten-aged students at Shawsheen School. Kid's Club, a program for first through sixth graders, opened in 1991. Needing more space in the late 1990s, SHED renovated a Phillips Academy building for its kindergarten program and built a new facility for Kid's Club, which opened at 65 Phillips St. in 1998.
For several years, spaces in SHED were so tough to get that Andover parents camped out overnight on the lawn of the Shawsheen School to secure a spot for their child in the popular kindergarten program, Designated dads usually handled middle-of-the-night coffee runs.
