Along the Escritora María Teresa León street, a wide boulevard a few meters from the Quirónsalud Córdoba hospital and not far from the Reina Sofía, the morning arrives fresh and wanted to join the change of scenery, as if September were something more than a calendar convention. It is the 2nd, first working day of the ninth month and for many the workdays are over. vacation.
In the welcoming shadow of a morning that does not invade them, processions of small children, accompanied by fathers, mothers or both, leave the streets and neighboring doors in search of people who will welcome them warmly. smile and that they will have to accompany them throughout the journey. The new year begins in nursery schools with the end of summer.
The area known as Nuevo Poniente is one of those that has been filled in recent years with young families and that is why it is not surprising that on the same boulevard there are up to three establishments formerly known as daycare centersbecause there are many children, a rare commodity in other neighborhoods of Cordoba.
Francisco Carmona stops at Elefantil, carrying his four-year-old daughter and one-year-old son. The little girl already knows her teachers and happily enters kindergarten. “It’s the best option we have, when we’re both functioning“, he said. In the entire province of Cordoba, some 8,300 children have started the course.
Evolution
At the door of the center, its director, Hope Sevilleconfirms the impression that their services are in demand in this area of Córdoba: there are many children and therefore a lot of demand: “We are fully booked”. They have visited all the places and have noticed the neighborhood growth in recent years.
Elefantil has been open for ten years, but in the last five years demand has intensified to fill the 35 places. “It’s nothing like what happened before; now the demand is greater,” he explains, speaking of his long working hours from 7:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Francisco Carmona also speaks about it, who at other times had to resort to health centers. Garden cityNow he can take his children just a few meters from home and sees the advantage.
A few meters further is Imaginewhich recently opened in Nuevo Poniente, but started in the southern sector, on Motril Street. Mirella Martínez, its director, has noticed the difference: “The children of teachers and workers from both hospitals, Quirón and Reina Sofía, arrive here. The change is enormous.”
Demand means that many daycares do not even close at Christmas, summer or Easter.
It is a company with experience in education, as it manages the program Little musiciansthat they have taken to many centers in Cordoba as an extracurricular activity. Serve while the children arrive. “Sleep? Does he use a pacifier?
It is essential to know everything to serve them in a place where there is even a inflatable castleand which remains open all year round, even at Christmas and Easter, because parents increasingly need its services.
And a little closer to Airport Avenue, two mothers met, Adelina Alcaïde and Rosa Pérez, who treat Angie López Redondo, director of the Mariposas nursery school, with familiarity. “My son is so happy that he didn’t even let me say goodbye,” Adelina Alcaide almost complains.
This is perhaps the best thermometer children know. happy to the place they will now have to reach. This is the second course of the center that bears the name of Papillons, because the current leaders have taken over the transfer of a previous center.
“It’s a young neighborhood and has lots of demand” he says as the little ones find their place and are divided between the zero to two and two to three year old classes, depending on their age.
Another young area is the Trassierra highway, between the Glorieta Amadora and the shopping center. Round of Cordoba. One of the nursery schools is called Mi Casita and has fourteen years of experience. Its director, María Ángeles Torres, hopes that in the coming days the four or five places that are currently lacking, out of the 35 they have, will be filled.
Four teachers are in charge of taking care of the children and, as in the rest, there is an air of reunion and celebration. Julia Dolores Fernández takes her children for the second year and is very happy: “They stimulate children with fine motor skills and helps them a lot. That’s why I like it,” he emphasizes.
The San José preschool in Plaza del Indiano is not even half full in a sparsely populated area.
Mothers from a region of Cordoba that has continued to grow in recent years continue to arrive and as you walk you see the same landscape of families young people and small children.
But the same thing does not happen throughout the city. A school for children is opened in the Plaza del Indiano called Saint Joseph and was born at the initiative of the parish of the Trinity. Today, it is part of the Santos Mártires Diocesan Educational Foundation and its situation is reversed.
As we approach, we hear the children and the atmosphere is no different, but its director, Ana Madueñoexplains that it is not even half full: there are 24 children when it has a capacity of 56. The Center of Cordoba, and even less the Jewish Quarter, continues to lose population. Two realities of the same city.
