MISSION VIEJO : College Opens New Children’s Center

Saddleback College celebrated the opening last week of a new Child Development Center that college officials say is one of the most progressive in the nation.

Child Development Center director Sandy Phillips and staff recently moved out of their old quarters in a portable building on the lower campus into the new 13,000-square-foot building on College Drive.

The college has been offering child care for students and faculty since 1977. The center has been planned since 1987.

Phillips said that most people in the child-care field “can’t believe their eyes” when they walk into the $2.2-million center, which looks more like a large home with a back yard filled with playground equipment.

“It’s just a beautiful facility,” Phillips said.

Inside, the center includes an infant room with nine cribs, three kitchens, two observation rooms for parents, faculty and students, and four playground areas--two for preschool-aged children, one for infants and one for toddlers.

The preschool playground includes an indoor-outdoor aquarium. The observation rooms include reflecting windows so that children are not distracted by observers.

The new center, college officials say, will allow for expansion of services to toddlers and infants.

At capacity, the center, which is accredited with the National Assn. for Education of Young Children, will accommodate 80 preschool-aged children and 20 infants and toddlers. Before, Saddleback College could only offer child-care services for preschool-aged children.

“This is everything a working mother could hope for as far as feeling her child was really the center of attention and being cared for well,” said Nancy Hitter, a graduate student at Cal State Fullerton who is doing her master’s project on the center.

Students and faculty in Saddleback College’s human development program will also use the center for teaching and observation studies.

Faculty offices for the program are also in the center.

For information on rates and services, contact the center at (714) 582-4582.