Published March 2002

Conference center raises funds, fulfills mission of Little Red School House

By Kimberly Hilden
Herald Business Journal Assistant Editor

In these tight economic times, the nonprofit Little Red School House Inc. has turned a portion of its Children’s Village into a revenue-generating operation that serves its mission and the public.

That operation, the Conference and Training Center at The Children’s Village, leases space to businesses, community groups and other organizations that want to hold a conference, retreat or staff training programs.

The 5,000-square-foot conference center includes a large meeting room that holds as many as 75 people in a classroom-style setup, two smaller conference rooms that can hold as many as 30 people depending on seating arrangements and two smaller meeting rooms with a board-table setup. Kitchen facilities are available as is assistance in arranging for catering service and equipment rental.

Open since last spring, the conference center, located at 14 E. Casino Road in Everett, recently began marketing itself to the public. That aspect has been “a whole new venture” for the nonprofit, which provides early-childhood education and therapy to children with disabilities and developmental delays, said Colleen Wartelle, Community Outreach Coordinator for Little Red School House.

“But I really do believe that the nonprofits that are going to survive this are going to be ones that are creative in looking at options for increasing revenues as opposed to trying to raise money in the way that most of us are used to raising money: through grants or charitable drives and so forth,” she said. “You’ve got to have some arm of your organization that will help bring revenue in. ... For us, it will be this.”

What makes it work, Wartelle said, is that the conference center fits into Little Red School House’s mission, enabling the organization to bring training opportunities to early-childhood professionals and parents in the area while helping other groups in the community design and host their own conferences and training sessions.

That’s the reason the organization decided not to remodel the building when it bought the complex from Group Health Cooperative in December 1998, Wartelle said. It was already being used as a training center.

Besides the conference center, the four-building Village also houses Clothes For Kids, Deaconess Children’s Services, Early Head Start, Little Red School House, a toddler preschool, Sherwood Learning Center, Tech Steps and an interactive play space.

“This is so great,” Wartelle said, standing in the large meeting room, with its large windows looking out onto a courtyard. “You’ve got daylight; you can watch the children’s activities out there as they come and go. ... It’s a very pleasant environment.”

For more information on the center, call 425-353-5656.

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