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Announcing a new Institute on Creating Children's Environments

To provide information on creating healthy environments for children, White Hutchinson has helped plan a two-day Institute on Creating Sustainable Environments for Young Children for June 7-8 in Nebraska City, Nebraska.

Vicki Stoecklin's featured NAEYC Session on Creating Environments That Sustain Children, Staff & Our Planet was well attended in Atlanta. To download a copy of Vicki's PowerPoint presentation, go to www.whitehutchinson.com/children/NAEYC2006.

Many thanks to Ania Shapiro, who presented a beautiful slide show of creative and environmentally healthy child care centers. Ania is an architect with the General Services Administration, Office of Child Care, and graciously agreed at the last minute to help put this presentation together. GSA has led the way over the years in creating healthy and sustainable environments for young children across the U.S. GSA has created a great resource called the Child Care Center Design Guide that has many resources on sustainable environments for children. The guide can be downloaded from here.

One question that came up at the presentation was how could early childhood colleagues get more information on creating healthy indoor and outdoor environments for children?

In response to that question and many more, the White Hutchinson Leisure & Learning Group is pleased to announce, along with several like-minded colleagues, the birth of the two-day Institute on Creating Sustainable Environments for Young Children to be held on June 7-8, 2007, at the Lied Lodge and Conference Center in Nebraska City, Nebraska. A sustainable hotel and conference center, it is located at the Arbor Day Farm.

The course is designed for both early childhood practitioners and designers. Topics for the course include sustainable design practices, green building materials, design considerations for outdoor play gardens, choosing healthy furniture for children and other resources. Invited guests and speakers include Mary Gabriel, M.S., University of Nebraska; Amy Nichols, Design Works Studio, A.S.I.D; Ania Shapiro, A.I.A., L.E.E.D., GSA Office of Child Care; Nancy Rosenow, Dimensions Educational Research Foundation; Robin Moore, Natural Learning Initiative, College of Design, North Carolina State University; and Gretchen Preston, Gretchen's House.

More information about the course and registration materials can be found here on our web site. Registration is limited to 60 people, so register early.

Our group of interested colleagues hopes to empower you to make better design, purchasing and renovation choices that not only support children and staff, but also sustain Mother Earth. This Institute is too valuable to miss and will be held in place of the Early Childhood Design Institute. For additional information, e-mail Vicki. Graduate credit in early childhood education from National Louis University in Wheeling, Illinois, is available for the course.

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