Niagara Nursery School looking for community board member heading into 2025

Niagara Nursery School, which currently offers care to about 75 children, is going into the new year looking for board members.

Laura Townsend, mother and board member, says there is lots of interest in board positions from parents, however they are hoping to attract some interest in the community.

The nursery school has been an important part of the NOTL community for more than 50 years. Although she has seen a date of 1972 cited as the opening of NNS, she said, she hesitates to use that because she hasn’t been able to confirm it officially.

It began as a cooperative, Townsend explains, and became a corporation, so to legally operate requires a board to govern it, with five volunteer members.

“Throughout the years, we've been fortunate to welcome a variety of board members with different areas of expertise, skills and connections. Their individual contributions have been a critical part of the school's growth and development,” said Townsend, who will move into the role of president for 2025.

“As we kick off 2025 and a new board term, we look forward to exploring new and exciting opportunities for NNS, and we're keen to see how community members could potentially bring a fresh perspective and ideas to our amazing school.”

The board “is the executive branch of the centre and is responsible for such matters such as financial planning, capital improvements and legal issues. The board members are directly involved with the decision-making that drives the organization’s mandate and promotes Niagara Nursery School to Niagara-on-the-Lake,” she said.

There is no doubt, especially for parents in town, that the nursery school plays an important role in the community — even with a major expansion that saw it move to a much larger space beside the public library, there is a waiting list of about 280 children.

That list has grown in recent years, with the current provincial nursery school subsidy lowering the cost for parents and making it affordable for mothers who might otherwise have chosen not to return to work after having a baby.

“It’s expensive to run a day care centre,” she said, especially based on what they can charge, as set by the province. NNS is also able to apply for grants through the region, “and we do a lot of fundraising.”

While the majority of NNS students live in NOTL, there are several families using NNS programs who come from Niagara Falls and St. Catharines, Townsend said, explaining that as spaces become available, students to fill them are selected from a list of registered day care centres from the Niagara Region Child Care Registry Site.

The number of children at NNS fluctuates around capacity, particularly the number of staff in each of the programs, and how many kids can be in a particular class, with programs for infants and children up to preschool age, and before and after school care of kids up to 12 years old.

The child care centre is also able to offer Christmas, March break and summer programs as well for enrolled families, said Townsend.

Board positions include president, treasurer, secretary, director of fundraising and director of policies and procedures, she said, with board meetings held monthly, typically lasting a couple of hours, with some “light administrative work throughout the month - emails etc.”

If they were to find a community member interested in a board position, their particular skills and interests would be taken into consideration, she said.

Having a community member can help bring a different perspective to board discussions, Townsend explained, possibly with a little more objectivity that a parent whose children attend the nursery school.

If interested in more details, email Townsend at [email protected]