YMCA launches bilingual academy for 3- to 5-year-olds

The YMCA plans to launch the “Little Learners Bilingual Academy” for kids 3 to 5 years old this fall in collaboration with the United Methodist Church of the Good Shepherd.

They are now looking for students to enroll in the year-round program.

The academy will be enrolling until the end of the September and will run from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Mondays through Fridays, with 90-minute buffers in the mornings and afternoons (7:30-9 a.m. and 3-4:30 p.m.) for working parents who need flexibility.

Tuition will be $310 per week, though Lebanon Valley Family YMCA CEO William Zazynski noted the YMCA offers financial aid for families who cannot afford the program at full price.

The program is open to students with Spanish or English as their first language; 60% of education will be offered in students’ second language in core subjects like math, social studies, and science. The Y’s existing childcare centers have already added Spanish-speaking activities and have Spanish-speaking staff, she said, which paved the way for the academy.

“We have found, over the years, we’ve had a lot of people move into the area from Spanish-speaking countries, and they need some support in these areas,” said YMCA School Age Child Care director Mary Andrews. “We want to help those students and families get more acclimated to the area and kind of get a jump-start learning language. For any of our other students, it’s kind of opening the world, starting early, making them a global citizen. We found that it improves executive function, problem-solving abilities, and it increases academic performance throughout a lifetime learning a language early.”

Early exposure to second languages makes reaching fluency easier, and is associated with other benefits like better academic performance and greater understanding of different cultures, explained Andrews.

“From an early age, they’re going to be aware of another culture: more accepting, more welcoming,” she said. “Really, what we want to see is giving these kids a chance to be global citizens, to be able to get this exposure early and then venture out and not be afraid to try new things, or to travel and meet new people.”

Bob Mease of the Church of the Good Shepherd at 1500 Quentin Road, where the program will be held, recalled traveling to South America for mission trips and struggling to communicate. He said he has a friend in Switzerland, where students are raised multilingual, who speaks four languages.

“I felt at such a disadvantage because I could not communicate, and the role was reversed,” said Mease of his mission trips. “I was the person who couldn’t communicate. And it’s so self-defeating when you’re trying to express yourself and you can’t get that meaning across to the person.

“The majority of Americans speak one language, and that’s English. And I think this is a step in the right direction to try to change that, especially given our mix in our population.”

The YMCA’s mission, as Zazynski noted, is “to put Christian principles into practice through programs that build healthy spirit, mind and body for all.” The program is open to students of any background or faith, as well as for families based in or out of the county.

“Those last two words are, ‘for all,'” Zazynski emphasized. “In many cases, it’s a gateway for many families, for their first experience with the YMCA. So we can get families in and teach them life skills, teaching them caring, honesty, respect, responsibility as some of our core values in the programs that we do. … All those different things build a better child, so if we can do those, first and foremost, I think that’s important.”

Zazynski said he was excited to work with the church on the program, especially with a shared religious mission.

“I think one of the foundations of the partnership between us and the Church of the Good Shepherd is that our foundations are based on Christ and Christian ethics,” said Zazynski. “However, we are inclusive to all, open to all, and respect different religions as well.”

Mease said that the church is interested in serving the community in various ways, such as through a clothing closet for families with kids in need of clothes and a previous daycare program with Cornwall Children’s Center.

The church, Zazynski added, contains “these beautiful classrooms on their campus along with a beautiful playground that’s contained that meets licensing standards. We think it’s a win-win for both, it’s a great partnership for both entities.”

The YMCA plans to continue running this program in future years.

“There’s a community need,” said Zazynski. “We see it just from our operations day to day; I’m only eight months new to the community, and just seeing sometimes the challenging language barriers from both sides of English and Spanish. And so it’s a way that we’re meeting that need and bringing the community together for the future of the children in this community.”

An official start date for the program has not been finalized, but the YMCA encourages families to enroll their kids this month. Interested families can email childcare@lebanonymca.org or call (717)376-1384.