'No swim' advisory near Naples Pier has been lifted
LOCAL

Naples YMCA to get $3 million matching grant for early education center

Patrick Riley
patrick.riley@naplesnews.com; 239-263-4825

The Greater Naples YMCA on Wednesday said it will receive a $3 million matching grant that will help fund a new early education center.

The center will help get children ready for kindergarten and school and will aid them in overcoming developmental challenges and learning disabilities.

An anonymous donor pledged the matching grant to contribute to the organization's capital campaign, which aims to raise the money needed to help pay for the 25,000-square-foot center.

Ground is expected to be broken next year for the $9 million project, which will be built on the YMCA's campus in North Naples.

Rendering of the proposed Gaynor Early Learning Center that will be located on the Greater Naples YMCA campus. The center will feature custom-designed classrooms, playground courtyard access from every classroom, observation windows in each classroom and direct access to pediatric and therapeutic services next door.

"This is a huge boost for us," said Kae Moore, the organization's financial development director. "No question about that."

Once the organization raises the money to match the anonymous donation, it will be more than halfway toward fully funding the project.

"We're just getting started," Moore said.

Rendering of the proposed Gaynor Early Learning Center that will be located on the Greater Naples YMCA campus. The center will feature custom-designed classrooms, playground courtyard access from every classroom, observation windows in each classroom and direct access to pediatric and therapeutic services next door.

The new center will be at the forefront of the organization's push to tackle the area's struggles to adequately prepare children for their school years, said Paul Thein, president and CEO of Greater Naples YMCA.

A recent study in Collier County found only 28 percent of children entering kindergarten scored "school ready," he said.

"So, really, the majority of children are entering kindergarten behind," Thein said.

The YMCA aims to reverse that trend, he said, with "wraparound services" at the center, which would bring in therapists, doctors and teachers to serve up to 280 patrons.

"We want to catch everything from speech delays, developmental delays, tooth decay — everything early," Thein said. "And we want to protect the children with services like drowning prevention."

The sooner any issues or disabilities are detected, the better, he said.

"We want to take things like dyslexia and find it early so that when the child goes into first, second or third grade, they're not struggling," Thein said. "There's interventions and there's programming and there's teaching that can come into place to really help the child."

YMCA members will receive discounts on tuition, and the nonprofit organization receives a yearly grant that "provides affordable access for everybody," Thein said.

"We don't turn anybody away," he said. "It's not for the wealthy. It's for everybody."

Rendering of the proposed Gaynor Early Learning Center that will be on the Greater Naples YMCA campus. The center will feature custom-designed classrooms, playground courtyard access from every classroom, observation windows in each classroom and direct access to pediatric and therapeutic services next door.

The YMCA's capital campaign is led by a trio of co-chairs: former National Football League player Matt Birk; his wife, Adrianna; and Lavern "Lal" Gaynor, a longtime supporter of the YMCA. The center will be named in honor of Gaynor.

For Matt Birk, who lives in Naples with his wife and his eight children, helping to raise the money for the project is somewhat of a personal mission.

His daughter Madison, 14, recently was diagnosed with severe dyslexia.

"Part of me, when we found out, it made total sense to us," Birk said. "But part of me also thought, 'How come this wasn't caught earlier?' And again, we're going to some of the best schools in the country, and they couldn't catch this. That won't happen here with this model because of all the resources that will be on campus."

The new center will help keep children "on the trajectory to success" and is a "forward-thinking" solution that is needed, Birk said.

"It's a new approach to an old problem."