Tulsa's Crosstown Learning Center Getting $7.5M Upgrade

An early learning center broke ground Tuesday in an area of Tulsa that hasn’t seen a new multi-million dollar development of this kind in years.

The Crosstown Learning Center has served the Kendall-Whittier area for nearly 50 years, and the center’s leaders said they plan to build on that tradition.

For years, the center has used churches or existing buildings as classrooms; but over the next six months to a year, they are transforming an open space into a new $7.5 million facility, designed specifically for the students.

“This is for them, and it's a wonderful day, and it will ensure not only their future but the future of other children," said Debbi Guilfoyle with Crosstown Learning Center.

For 46 years, the early childhood learning center has been in the Kendall Whittier neighborhood - serving children from all socioeconomic levels ages six weeks to pre-k.

"It is time to say a deep, deep, thank you to all of the people that have helped make this possible," Guilfoyle said.

1/12/2016 Related Story: Tulsa's Crosstown Learning Center Breaks Ground For New Building

Josh Miller works with the George Kaiser Family Foundation - one of many private and individual donors that helped pay for the new center.

"The foundation believes early childhood development is critical, is sort of, the key beginning factor in a child's success," he said.

Miller's son also attends the center.

"It's not just a place to let your kid come and take care of them in the day; it's a place where they learn. Kids even young as my son - 3 months old - have a curriculum, and so it affects their social, emotional growth, physical growth, and intellectual growth and it’s really impactful in their early years,” he said.

The current center serves 90 students, but when the new center is finished they'll be able to serve 115.

"This is a real big thing for us, it's real big," Guilfoyle said.

Leaders said the new building will also be available as a community center to serve the greater Kendall-Whittier area.

Once the building is finished, the old one will be torn down.