CentroNía (formerly Calvary Bilingual Multicultural Learning Center)
http://www.centronia.org
1420 Columbia Road, NW
Washington, DC 20009
202-332-4200

Founded in 1986

Founder, Executive Director: Beatriz (BB) Otero
Board: 13 members; Chuck Bean, chair
Staff: 102 full time, 7 part time, and 10 AmeriCorps members; 150 volunteers
2003 budget: $4 million

Mission and History
The mission of CentroNía (formerly Calvary Bilingual Multicultural Learning Center) is “to create a community of learning for children, youth, families, and staff.”

BB Otero founded the learning center in 1986 as a childcare center for 15 children and housed it in a local church. The organization grew organically in the Columbia Heights/Mt. Pleasant neighborhood, developing new programs to meet the growing needs of children and families. The learning center now provides programs for over 400 infants, children, youth, and their families. Many “CentroNìa kids” have grown up in the center and several high school graduates and college students return to work or volunteer there.

In 1995, Bell Atlantic donated a boarded-up switching station to the learning center. The center quickly renovated a small part of the building to move into and then in 2000 raised approximately $2.3 million of the $5.6 million renovation cost (the balance was a Community Development Block Grant and a bank loan) to completely renovate the 73,000-square-foot facility, which today includes a childcare center, a dance studio, a community technology lab, a commercial kitchen, and a rooftop playground (as well as three nonprofit tenants).

Services
The learning center provides a wide range of services to more than 400 infants, children, and youth in infant/toddler development, early-childhood development and enrichment activities, after-school programs, and tutoring for elementary school children and teens. Children are exposed to technology training and a rich array of arts, which is infused across all programming. In addition, the center provides enrichment activities and ongoing professional development opportunities through programs, workshops, and referrals for family members and parents through its Family Institute and Family Literacy programs.

Professional Development Institute
The Center provides the only Spanish/English Child Development Associate (CDA) training available in DC. Since October 1999, approximately 190 trainees have completed the 120-hour program, of which 70 have completed additional requirements for CDA certification. In 2002, 125 participants were enrolled in the program.