Recess just became a lot more fun for the students of Harbor Child Care’s New Hyde Park location.
The daycare and afterschool program for students, located at the Herricks community center, recently completed its new playground project. A ribbon-cutting ceremony for the playground was held on Dec. 8.
The playground will help students engage more with the outdoors, which Smita Daniel, center director, said is important for this generation of children.
“They are born with the [tech] skills,” Daniel said. “You ask them, ‘Where do tomatoes come from,’ and they say ‘the store.'”
The center plans on having outdoor classes and gardening by the playground in the future, Daniel said.
Arnold Goldberg, Harbor Child Care executive director, said they decided to go first class when creating the playground.
The replacement project would not have been possible without the help of Herricks Union Free School District Superintendent Fino Celano and his staff, Goldberg said.
Herricks let Harbor Child Care use their district architect at no charge, Goldberg said.
The playground has a new rubber safety surface area. It also features custom-made structures for children ages 2 to 12.
The most exciting part about the new playground is the area for infants, which the former playground didn’t have, Daniel said.
“Now the infants can kind of crawl around and climb,” Daniel said.
The infant area is for any that can walk, which Daniel said will be the infants between 12 and 18 months.
The infant area also has musical playground equipment the children can play with and experiment on.
The Harbor Child Care program serves children three-months-old to 12-years-old between the daycare and afterschool program.
The playground will be well used by Harbor Child Care students for many years to come.
The program is in it’s 36th year at the Herricks Community center, and signed on to another five year lease for the building, Goldberg said.
“We’re not leaving after that,” he added.
Correction: A previous version of this article stated that the ribbon cutting was held on Dec. 9, it was held on Dec. 8. The previous version also incorrectly spelled Smita Daniel’s name as Smitha.
