Struggling Catholic day care center reaches out to community

JOLIET – Sonia Jaime-Ulloa of Joliet opened a letter from the Vilaseca Day Care Center last week, expecting to find a re-registration form so she can sign her 4-year-old son, Orivel, up for next year.

Instead, the letter confirmed rumors the 32-year-old mother had been hearing over the past few months: That the struggling bilingual Catholic day care center and preschool at 351 N. Chicago St. could very well close by the end of March.

“I got my pen out ready to sign my son up for next year, but then I opened it and started reading it,” Jaime-Ulloa said Monday. “I told my husband this was not the letter I was expecting. We were both in shock.”

School officials announced last week that the day care center, which first opened in Joliet in 1974, could shut down two months shy of the end of the school year, citing a decline in enrollment.

The facility, which relies heavily on tuition revenue, has enrolled about 80 children each year since the Josephine Sisters of Mexico City moved the center to its current location in 1981. But this month, that number is down to 49, said Sister Araceli Perez, the center’s longtime director.

“At the beginning of the school year [in August], we started with 64, but then some don’t come back. We lose a few each month. This month, two parents lost their jobs,” Perez said. “We have four children in the 3-year-old’s class. We started out at the start of the school year with 11.”

School officials are calling on the community in hopes of staying open until the end of the school year.

“We’re reaching out to the parents, to former parents, to alumni, the parishes, and the community for help,” said Mina Flores, longtime secretary at Vilaseca. “Then, on the same token, we’ll pass out our fliers so we can start getting children. Our goal is to get the children.”

Perez said the facility needs about $60,000 to stay open through the end of the school year, but fundraising efforts alone will only take the center so far. More children need to be enrolled for next year if the center can survive beyond that, she said.

Vilaseca’s operating budget is about $560,000 this year, Flores said. The center is funded mostly through tuition revenue, but also receives some funding through the United Way of Will County, and its food program is sponsored by the Illinois Board of Education.

“We’re in the red every day. If someone comes in to pay their tuition, then we’re in the black,” Flores said. “We’re living day-by-day.”

The center, which gives lessons in both English and Spanish, has five programs or classes for children from 15 months to kindergarten, along with about 16 employees and four nuns on staff. The nuns began the program in 1974, operating from a house on Herkimer Street before moving into the former KSKJ building.

Jaime-Ulloa, who attended the day care center as a child, hopes the community can pull together to help the center through this difficult time.

“My father helped them moved here [to 351 N. Chicago St.]. It was nice back then how the community came together to help the center,” she said. “It would be so great if the community could come together again, financially, and help the center stay open through the end of the school year, and hopefully, I’m crossing my fingers, long enough to create a long-term plan so they can stay open for many, many more years.”

Learn more about Vilaseca Day Care Center

For information, contact the director of Vilaseca, Sister Araceli Perez, at 815-727-1467.

Donations can be sent to Vilaseca Day Care Center, 351 N. Chicago St., Joliet, IL, 60432. Checks should be made out to Vilaseca Day Care Center.