Director Lynda Kraus likes everything about the newly renovated FirstHealth Child Development Center, but the thing she likes best is something that doesn’t even exist anymore.
A waiting list.
Kraus labored over that list — which at any one time always included the names of 80 to 100 or more children — and empathized with the FirstHealth employees who waited for a year or more to get their child in the five-star-rated child care facility.
That particular worry evaporated on Aug. 18, with the full opening of the renovated center.
“It’s super,” says Kraus. “It’s wonderful.”
Kraus gives the FirstHealth Moore Regional Hospital Auxiliary much of the credit for the success of the renovation project. Every dollar that the Auxiliary has raised toward a five-year, $1 million pledge has gone to the Center, which is located on the campus of FirstHealth Moore Regional Hospital, and will continue to go there until the full pledge has been fulfilled.
Proceeds from the Auxiliary’s 2003 Holiday Ball will be no exception. The annual fund-raising event is scheduled for Saturday, Dec. 13, at The Carolina in Pinehurst.
“The Auxiliary’s contributions to this project started even before we heard they were going to give us the gift of money,” Kraus says. “I have spoken to the Auxiliary several times, and the members always asked about the waiting list. They feel very strongly about having a high-quality program in the area for the children of FirstHealth employees.”
It would be hard to find someone who feels more strongly about the Child Development Center than Joanne Kilpatrick, a former Hospital Auxiliary president. She and her husband, Dr. Kirby Kilpatrick, a retired obstetrician and gynecologist, are chairmen of the 2003 Holiday Ball.
In nearly 30 years of obstetrical practice in Moore County, Dr. Kilpatrick delivered more than 6,000 of the community’s babies. Because of that, his wife says, the Child Development Center “is very dear to our hearts.” Both encouraged the Auxiliary to take on the Center as a fund-raising project.
“We realize how important child care is to families who work in the hospital,” Joanne Kilpatrick says. “We watched the Child Development Center get started as the Little People’s Village. We have watched the construction and growth, and we have seen how frustrated mothers have been when they couldn’t get their children in because of the long waiting list.”
Until the recent project was completed, the 12,690-square-foot Center could accept a maximum of 135 children. Some 160 children are currently enrolled. A two-phase construction and renovation project more than doubled the Center’s square footage, adding enough room to accommodate as many as 250 children in 30,000 square feet of space.
The overall project began with the construction of a new wing. When that area was completed and opened in March, the children and staff moved into it while the old wing was completely refurbished. The large rooms, new paint and floor coverings create a spacious, comfortable and completely child-friendly environment.
The changes gave the Center two new infant rooms, two new classrooms for 1-year-olds and one new classroom each for 2-, 3- and 4-year-olds, as well as indoor play spaces, a multi-purpose room that doubles as a cafeteria for the older children, a conference room/library and a breastfeeding room.
The addition of a large room for before- and after-school care for kindergartners and first-graders also freed up space at the Wyatt Center, an off-campus program for the school-aged children of FirstHealth employees. And a keyless security system offers state-of-the art protection for the facility.
“All of the changes have been positive,” says Kraus, “and it’s been so nice to be able to ask parents when they want their child to start instead of telling them they’re on a waiting list.”
Brenda Bouser works for the Corporate Communications Department of FirstHealth of the Carolinas in Pinehurst.
