Longtime Wyckoff Preschool Changes with the Times

For Apple Tree Early Childhood Development Center executive director Vera Stern, preschool is a family business; and after recently taking over the Goffle Road operation, she’s making some changes to the longstanding school.

“When my mom started preschools, I was in the seventh grade. So I’ve worked in them my whole life,” Stern says.

Stern took over the family business in November, and is now preparing for her first full school year at Apple Tree, bringing with her changes to the facility and its programs.

The school, which offers full day kindergarten and two years of preschool programming in addition to childcare from newborns up, has always based its efforts on preparing students for elementary school, with multiple class subjects and a classroom setting modeled closely on the public school kindergarten curriculum.

One of Stern’s efforts has been to upgrade the technology in the classrooms of the 19-year-old school, replacing older computers with newer models, even considering iPad purchasesto supplement preschool teacher instruction with educational games.

“At that age, they want to learning on the computer,” Stern says.

Another effort she’s made is involving parents more with the programming decisions the school makes, including the weekly field trips that take classes to educational facilities around Bergen County.

“We try to tailor programs to what the kids and parents want,” she says. “Things that are going to go to the whole development of the child. When they go to public school, they’re well-rounded.”

Security has been another issue that the decades-old school has not had to deal with in the past, and something Stern has emphasized since she took over, equipping classroom doors with alarm systems and providing key fobs to parents for access to the building.

With the changes, though, come a longtime staff, many of whom have seen their own children go through the programs and stuck around for years afterward, adding consistency to the building even as some of its features change.

“We have a lot of people with kids in the school that work here and then stay,” Stern says. “People stay with us a long time.”