NVCC celebrates Child Development Center’s new outdoor play area, 30th anniversary

WATERBURY (May 1, 2007) — In a ceremony Thursday, April 26, Naugatuck Valley Community College celebrated a newly renovated outdoor play area for its Child Development Center and marked the center’s 30th anniversary.

The center’s new Stephen M. Colwell Outdoor Play Environment is named after the college’s former dean of administration, who was the driving force behind efforts to secure funds to pay for the improvements through the Americans with Disabilities Act.

On April 26, NVCC celebrated the new Stephen M. Colwell Outdoor Play Area

Located on the north end of Kinney Hall, the new play area includes a paved section for children to ride toys outside, as well as extensive landscaping, a large digging area, pathways and tree stumps to climb on and jump from. It also features an amphitheater built into an adjacent hill for storytelling or performances, and a gate to the nearby woods for supervised walks. Previously, the area had no landscaping and was unsafe in some parts due to ruts and holes.

NVCC’s Child Development Center offers daycare, pre-school and kindergarten classes to about 60 children, aged 18 months to 6 years old from Waterbury and surrounding towns. It opened Jan. 31, 1977, with one classroom at what was then Mattatuck Community College. The center also acts as a training site for the college’s early childhood education program and is accredited by the National Association for the Education of Young Children.

More than 50 people attended the ceremony April 26 to dedicate the center’s new play area and celebrate the center’s 30th anniversary, including Dr. Colwell and his family, NVCC President Dr. Richard L. Sanders and Waterbury Mayor Michael J. Jarjura.

Located off exit 18 on Interstate 84, NVCC serves more than 10,000 credit and non-credit students from 35 communities across western Connecticut from Litchfield to Waterbury to Seymour to Southbury and Danbury.

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