SUNDRE – The new executive director at the non-profit Sundre Daycare Centre says she lives for those eureka moments when a child excitedly demonstrates something they’ve just learned to do.
“My favourite part of working with children is those moments where it just clicks for them,” said Harley Telgen, who started her administrative position on Nov. 1.
“Say, for example, we’ve been working so hard at getting them to put their own shoes on or zip up their own coats, and then one day they finally get it and they come to you and say, ‘Look – I got it, I got it!’” Telgen told the Albertan on Nov. 15.
“Those are the moments I live for.”
Originally from Brockville, Ont. where she was raised, went to school and eventually completed a three-year program to earn a diploma in Child and Youth Care, Telgen said she initially came to Alberta for what was intended to be a fairly brief stint.
“I was only supposed to be here for a month, actually,” she said, adding with a chuckle, “five-and-a-half years later, I’m still here!”
However, her career path took something of an unexpected and sudden change during her high school days.
“I actually wanted to be a nurse. I did a work placement through my high school and they couldn’t get me into a hospital or a nursing home or anything. So, my teacher actually placed me in a daycare; a toddler room,” she said. “I immediately fell in love with it.”
Telgen said she from that point on never looked back in the rear view mirror.
When she saw the position at the Sundre Daycare Centre advertised on a social media networking group she’s a part of, Telgen did not hesitate to apply.
“I knew that I wanted to be in a full-time administrative position in a daycare,” she said, adding she is familiar with what being on the frontline is like, which brings valuable experience and insight to the administrative perspective.
Although she was only two weeks into the job when she spoke with the Albertan, Telgen, who now calls a little acreage east of Olds home, said things to date have gone well.
“I’m enjoying getting to know kids and the families,” she said.
“And the staff are amazing,” she added, praising assistant executive director Soleil Rothenburg as well as the non-profit’s executive board of directors.
“So, I feel very much at home here.”
Asked if she perhaps had any particular plans with regards to the direction of programs, she said, “For now, I’m just learning their programming style.”
But she also hopes to help further grow the kindergarten program.
“The kindergarten program is doing amazing,” she said, adding it could yet be built up a little more.
“It needs some enrolment and some encouragement from the community I think would be very important for that program.”
