MCC program trains early childhood educators
Tina Leggette had always known she wanted a career working with young children even when she was a child herself.
Leggette, a Meridian Community College graduate and director of Meridian KinderCare Learning Center, was always the older child who would play with the younger ones, who made sure they were taken care of and who created games and activities for them to do. She loved babysitting as a teen.
After graduating from Meridian High School in 1991, she got a job and started a family instead of pursuing her interest in becoming a preschool teacher. It was her volunteer work when her children were in child care at Head Start that started her thinking once again about a career in early childhood education.
“My passion has always been about wanting to see a better future for our kids,” said Leggette, who decided to go back to school in 2003 and enrolled in the Early Childhood Education Technology program at Meridian Community College.
“Early childhood education plays such an important part in kids’ lives. Their learning starts as soon as they are born,” she said. “For me, it is amazing to see how much they change from the time they come here at age one to when they are five years old. They have learned so much.”
According to the National Education Association, studies have shown that students who participate in preschool programs when they are younger are less likely to repeat grades, need special education or get into future trouble with the law and are more likely to graduate from high school, to own homes and have longer marriages than those who do not attend preschool.
“Early childhood education is essential for children because it is the foundation for all they will learn throughout school,” said Win Maxey-Shumate, instructor and coordinator for MCC’s Early Childhood Education Technology program. “If they do not have a good foundation early on, then they will struggle throughout the rest of school.”
The MCC program, which began in 1998, is designed to prepare graduates for a career in early childhood education. Students learn the best practices of working with children from birth, including ideas for teaching math, science, reading and creative art, as well as learn about the importance of child safety and nutrition. They learn ways to encourage the social, emotional, physical and independence skills of children before kindergarten, Maxey-Shumate noted.
Students who graduate from the two-year program earn an associate of applied science degree and are eligible to take the Pre-Professional Assessment and Certification (Pre-PAC) national test offered by the American Association of Family & Consumer Sciences and the FCS Credentialing Center.
Many of the program’s graduates work as local preschool teachers. But, some are now daycare directors and some continued their education and are regular classroom teachers.
Maxey-Shumate said students who graduate from the program could usually expect to earn a higher wage in the early education field than someone without a degree.
“It is a wonderful program,” said Cassandra Amerson, owner of First Step Learning Center in north Meridian, who earned her associate degree from the program in 2013.
“The instructors in the program taught me so many things about children,” she said. “They helped me be better prepared for when I started teaching my own class and gave me a lot of ideas for lesson plans that I could use. They also taught me that not all children learn the same way, so you have to be able to recognize that child and keep working to find the niche that will work for that particular child. You never give up but keeping trying because there is more than one way for a child to learn.”
Amerson, who graduated from Meridian High School in 1992, worked for the Boys and Girls Club and with various local daycare centers before she decided to become a preschool teacher. She enrolled in MCC’s Early Childhood Education program in 2011 and after earning her associate’s degree went to work as a kindergarten teaching assistant in the Meridian Public School District.
“I got so many praises and compliments for things I was doing to work with the children, things I had learned in the MCC program,” she said. “So, I have always encouraged others working in early education to go through the program.”
After five years as an assistant, Amerson decided to open her own daycare, First Step, in 2019. She also is enrolled at the Meridian campus of Mississippi State University this fall to pursue her bachelor’s degree with her ultimate goal of becoming an elementary school principal. She credits her MCC instructors for encouraging her to do so.
“They (my instructors) always inspired me to go further into the field of education,” she said.
For Leggette, these are the most challenging times she has seen in the early education field since she earned her associate degree from MCC and started working for KinderCare 15 years ago. She worked for eight years as a preschool teacher, then a year as a toddler class teacher before becoming the assistant director four years ago. She has been the director at KinderCare for the past two years.
She said the number of children they can accept into the daycare and preschool had been cut in half due to the coronavirus pandemic's restrictions, and the rigorous cleaning guidelines and facial mask requirements are making for a challenging year.
For more information about this program or any of the other programs at MCC, go to www.meridiancc.edu