Y Academy at the Bolger Center for Early Childhood Education

Franklin County’s Y Partners with Northfield Mount Hermon to Manage & Operate The Bolger Center for Early Childhood Education, located on campus at NMH

Franklin County’s YMCA, located in Greenfield, MA, and Northfield Mount Hermon, located in Northfield, MA, are pleased to announce that the Y will assume full management of NMH’s childcare programs this summer to prepare for the opening of the fall semester of preschool and infant/toddler care. Under the Y’s leadership, the program will be known as the “Y Academy at the Bolger Center for Early Childhood Education.”

Franklin County’s Y will continue to operate its long-time full service preschool program and school age Before/After School programs, both of which remain at the Y’s Main Street facilities in Greenfield. Families living throughout Franklin County now have two convenient, reliable, and trusted options from which to choose when registering their children for preschool programming.

The Bolger Center partnership enables Northfield Mount Hermon to continue its tradition of providing distinctive early childhood education programs for its faculty and for families across northern Franklin County and southern Vermont and New Hampshire. Franklin County’s Y’s decades of respected award-winning success as a provider of childcare programming is ideally aligned with Northfield Mount Hermon in terms of mission and vision. Such integration creates an exceptional alliance, promising unparalleled curriculum delivery, quality of service, and a compassionate, safe environment, instilling confidence in all area families.

Brian Hargrove, NMH’s Head of School, notes, “We are incredibly excited to collaborate with Franklin County’s Y, knowing that the Y’s storied legacy of delivering exceptional early childhood education reflects our own mission. The Bolger Center for Early Childcare Education has served our employee children and others in the community lovingly and with great care since it opened in 2016. With the Y, we found a partner who will bring this same commitment forward in the years to come with the Y Academy.”

All key current Bolger Center faculty are expected to remain on staff. Carol Kennedy, Bolger Center Director shared that “We are all excited to refine our craft under the Y’s experienced leadership and to be given the gift of continuing to follow our passion for teaching, loving, and caring for our young charges!”

According to Grady Vigneau, Franklin County’s Y CEO, “Our Y is thrilled to leverage our long history of unparalleled child care expertise, further expanding our vision to ‘Love, Serve, Care’ across more of our county. Partnering with a nationally respected educational partner such as NMH is simply awesome!”

The Y’s Director of Child Care, Kara Younger, says that “this opportunity is a dream come true as we pursue our goals to offer safe, trusted, curriculum-based preschool education and toddler/infant care for as many families as possible who live in and about Franklin County.”

Fall semester registration is now open for our Infant/Toddler classrooms, our Preschool classrooms, and for our School Age Before/After School programs. All families are encouraged to visit www.your-y.org or call now for more information, pricing, and to confirm enrollment.