MV Kiddie Town Daycare and Summer Camp hosted an art exhibit for parents, friends and public at its location on 982 East 43rd St., Brooklyn on Wednesday Aug. 13, 2014.
Marthine Vicier, director of the daycare along with the Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP) said she wanted to highlight the achievements of the children who were taught arts and crafts for the entire summer.
Haitian-born Viciere, mother of three, has been living in Brooklyn for over 20 years. She recalls her childhood in Haiti growing up in an environment where people did not have much food and where children, including herself, not having places to go and things to do for summer. She believes that children need this, especially in the summer when their parents leave them all day in the hands of caregivers. When she got the opportunity to come to America, she pursued her dream to attend college. She attended Kingsborough Community College, where she obtained her AAA and AA degree in Early Childhood Education followed by her Bachelor of Arts degree in Early Childhood Education at Brooklyn College.
After graduating, she decided to open a daycare center as her way of giving back to the community. Viciere established MV Kiddie Town Daycare and Summer Camp in July 2005. “We work hard with the kids. Our kids when they leave here always go straight to kindergarten and the parents are always happy with us,” said Viciere.
Her daycare provides many activities for the children including exciting trips. She has taken the children to places such as the Bronx and the Brooklyn Zoo, various museums, libraries, fire departments and even colleges. The daycare also has computers and a piano on-site. The children have ample time to read and write. She opened up the daycare to give these children what she did not get as a child. According to Marthine, she ensures that the children have all of the opportunities that she did not have.
She also noted that the community has also been instrumental to the success of the daycare, particularly in the case of the art exhibit. One neighbor donated arts and crafts supplies. She believed that an art exhibit was the best way to show the parents what the children have been doing throughout the summer and raise awareness of what MV Kiddie Town Daycare was doing for the children in the community. She feels a great sense of pride and accomplishment with the art exhibit.
Viciere hopes the daycare will grow and develop into a franchise. She plans on doing that is with the help of the community and possibly forming a committee where different ideas are shared on how to expand. This was another reason for the exhibit as well. The children’s art exhibit serves as a platform to reach out to the community; to showcase the potential and promise of the MV Kiddie Town Daycare, how it affects the lives of the children in the community and to connect to the parents as well.
