It is only because of the loving, concerned members of Trinity Lutheran Church, who had a dream of giving Glory to God through the care of young children, that the following story has become history.
1980 – After 18 months of planning, Trinity Lutheran Church continued its ministry of caring for young children by opening a Baby-Sitting Center that was open two days a week. There were many requests throughout the year from the community to care for children of working parents.
1981 – Trinity opened its TLC Child Care Center on August 31, 1981 with 5 children enrolled. TLC specialized in quality care for Infants and Toddlers, although children 6 years of age and under were accepted into the program.
1982 – Enrollment increased rapidly, and TLC was given approval to expand to another room. Adding space allowed TLC to accommodate additional children in our program.
1983 – “Latch Key Kids” were a new phenomenon for our community and TLC felt compelled to extend their outreach to serve this population. A summer program for these children began.
1984 – TLC expanded again, allowing the school to divide into different age groupings. The “Latch Key” summer program was expanded to a full-time School Age Child Care program.
1985 – TLC Child Care Center became licensed by the State of Pennsylvania. In September, additional space for our School Age Program was added.
1986 – TLC had expanded to serve eighty-five children, growing to 17 times its original size in only five short years.
1987 – TLC’s SACC continued offering quality care to children in grades K though 3. The rest of the school continued to grow and offered services to children ages birth through six.
1988-1997 – TLC continued to prove that we offered the highest-quality care as we routinely scored 100% on all of our DPW inspections. Space for eight children were added in Older School Age Care at the 1995 inspection. An increasing number of parents requested Older School Age Care and TLC expanded its outreach to account for this need. Our DPW License was increased to allow for 126 children in May of 1995.
1998 – The School Age Child Care was expanded to include 5th and 6th graders.
2000 – TLC had 101 children enrolled in their ever-expanding outreach.
2005 – TLC enrolled in the Keystone STARs quality assurance program. Since its inception in 2002, the STARs designation has been a benchmark for Pennsylvania Early Childhood Programs.
2015 – TLC was awarded the highest ranking of STAR 4 through the Keystone STARs accreditation process. This award is a testament to TLC’s continued commitment to providing the highest level of care and shows that outside licensing agencies recognize the work that TLC does.
2020 – TLC continued to maintain their STAR 4 licensing status throughout the COVID-19 Pandemic shutdown. Though enrollment dropped, TLC’s teachers remained committed to providing high quality care to their students. Through online classrooms and email communication, teachers maintained a presence in their students’ lives. When the shut down ended, TLC came back just as strong as before.
2022 – TLC currently has 84 students enrolled and employs 24 staff members. We maintain our STAR 4 certification through the Keystone STARs accreditation agency and continuously seek to improve and update our education environment. After receiving the ARPA grant through the federal government, TLC began a several month’s long refurbishment project to update the look of the school and add more 21st century teaching tools in each of their classrooms.
2023 – TLC opened the Waddler Room. Children move up to this room from the Infant room when they begin to show signs that they are ready to crawl and/or walk, around 10 months, and then move to the Onesie room around 18 months. Our Waddler room has lots of space for our young walkers to try out their new skills, as well as a great deal of gross motor toys to help develop those muscles. The children in this room go through a lot of changes. They enter the Waddler room drinking bottles and perhaps taking two naps a day. By the time they leave this classroom, they’ll be fully drinking from sippy cups and down to one nap a day. In order to make room for the Waddler room, we moved the Pre-K classroom to the third floor, right alongside the other Pre-K class. With that transition, our two Pre-K classrooms are able to collaborate and work closely with each other, and are able to better utilize the same curriculum and materials.
2025 – TLC currently has 90 students enrolled and employs 22 staff members. We completed our Keystone Stars designation to maintain our STAR 4 certification. We purchased the Frogstreet Curriculum for our Preschoolers, which helps prepare them for Pre-K.