Jason Koski/University Photography

Children enjoy the new Bright Space room in the Red Cross Friendship Center.

Painted bright green and purple and furnished with child-sized furniture, art materials, games and toys, children now have a safe haven while their parents take care of business at the Red Cross Friendship Center, a homeless shelter and food pantry in Ithaca, thanks to Cornell Child Care Center's initiative with the Bright Horizons Foundation for Children Bright Space program.

On July 14, a ribbon-cutting ceremony officially opened the Marilyn Crone Friendship Center Bright Space, a dedicated play and learning environment located at the American Red Cross Homeless Service Building at 618 W. State St. About 40 people, including staff and educators from the Cornell Child Care Center and the American Red Cross, were on hand.

Patricia Sinclair, director of the Cornell Child Care Center, which is managed by Bright Horizons Family Solutions, said: "Bright Spaces is a program of The Bright Horizons Foundation for Children, which creates playrooms in homeless shelters and community agencies around the country. Our Bright Spaces give children and youth experiencing difficult times a place to play, to grow and to learn, to exercise their creativity and explore who they are and who they will be become." There are now more than 270 Bright Spaces located around the country and Europe, serving thousands of children each year.

Other partners involved in building the Ithaca play environment, which includes arts and crafts, board games, toys, books, a television, DVDs and video games, include the Friendship Center and Bright Horizons Family Solutions. Sinclair led the team of child care employees at the Cornell Child Care Center who raised money through such fundraising as selling vegetables grown at the center, parents night out and a silent auction and created the Bright Space room within the shelter.

"Children are our foundation and our future," said John Ward, program director of the Homeless Services Program at Tompkins County American Red Cross, during the ceremony.

"We really need to support children and families during times of distress, and we know that this Bright Space will provide a safe haven to do just that," he said. "People come here, and they're waiting for intakes into a homeless shelter. ... Now, we have this space to allow the parents to actually take care of their business in a way that's courteous to them and a way that's not so traumatizing to the children."

A similar project would typically take six months to one year to complete, explained Sinclair in an interview; however, Ward and the Cornell Child Care Center staff wanted to get it implemented quickly and were able to construct the room in two months. "Once we had the money, there was no stopping us," Sinclair said. "We wanted it done tomorrow, and our team was very motivated to get it done."

The Bright Space was dedicated in honor of Marilyn Crone, retiring regional manager of the Cornell Child Care Center for Bright Horizons. "I'm retiring," said Crone, "but I am not retiring from working with children and families."

"It took a village; it took everyone to make this happen. It's a vision they've had at the [Cornell] Child Care Center for the past three years," said Jevon Ballard, an education coordinator at the Cornell Child Care Center. "Thank you, thank you and thank you to everyone. It couldn't have been done without the help of every person."

Rebecca Harrison '14 is a writer intern for the Cornell Chronicle.