Eric and Elyssa Nelson represent everything that the Child Educational Center (CEC) in La Cañada, California, is. The couple, both Pacific Oaks alumni, founded the CEC in 1979 and have been leading it ever since—Elyssa serving most recently as executive director and Eric as director of consulting and professional development. Nationally accredited, the CEC had a pioneering focus on progressive education and outdoor learning.
The couple and the center will both enter the next phase of their stories once Eric and Elyssa officially retire come summer 2020.
Journey at Pacific Oaks
Eric started his coursework at Pacific Oaks in the fall of 1974. He has been working in early childhood education for half a century and cites Pacific Oaks as the impetus for what led him down this journey.
He never completed his master’s thesis, but only because he was hired to take over the Children’s Center at Caltech (CCC), which was failing at the time.
Elyssa, meanwhile, was taking post-B.A. classes in early childhood education at Santa Monica College—and it’s in those classes that Elyssa met Eric. She subsequently joined Eric at the CCC as a teacher.
Two years later, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) at Caltech wanted a center and asked Eric to lead the effort, resulting in the CEC. Eric and Elyssa started the center with their own unique vision.
“We were very fortunate that we were able to create the kind of center with the vision that we had,” Elyssa says. “Our vision statement very clearly specifies that … a place where everybody thrives, everybody learns from one another, and that we want to share our success with the bigger world.”
To them, that meant thinking outside the scope of what they were even offering. Yes, they were taking care of children. But to them, it was more.
“One of the really foundational and fundamental pieces was that we didn’t think of ourselves as a child care center,” Eric says. “We were very clear at the beginning on the things that were important to us and that we thought of ourselves as a community, so we built it as a community. Throughout the years, we stuck to that.”
Fresh into starting the center in the early 1980s, Elyssa enrolled at Pacific Oaks, inspired by what Eric had gotten out of his experience. Elyssa found it beautiful that she was able to apply what she was learning so directly to the CEC—and to reflect on how similar their values are.
“Pacific Oaks and the CEC were both involved in transformational psychology at that point, but in terms of the pedagogy at the CEC, it was absolutely inspired by our roots at Pacific Oaks,” Elyssa says. Eric continues, “Recognizing how PO started, how the school stood in the face of the fierceness of war, these are the values we stand for.”
What’s ahead
In 2003, the CEC started the Outdoor Classroom Project with a $1 million grant from First 5 LA, as an initiative to increase the amount of quality outdoor experiences for early childhood programs. Pacific Oaks Children’s School is one of 70 Demonstration Sites in California for the Outdoor Classroom Project.
This brought further recognition to the CEC as well as increased opportunities for the Nelsons to expand their impact—and how they wish to be remembered. Eric seeks to make the CEC’s entire vision more well-known—a venture both he and Elyssa will continue to work together on post-retirement. One thing’s for sure: Their work isn’t over yet.
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