Our History

                                
Playmates Learning Center started as Playmates Preschool when it was approved by the Sandown Zoning Board of Adjustment as a business in 1988. The Bureau of Child Care Standards and Licensing approved the preschool for operation in July 15, 1988 and the first Kindergarten class began in September, 1988.

The idea for a preschool originated with Ann Lake, a friend of Linda Meehan, who had been a teacher before staying home with her children and her desire to return to teaching. She suggested that the house at 56 North Road was a great environment to start a school with lots of indoor and outdoor space. Linda Meehan was preparing to decorate a large room in her home for a family room and decided to plan for both ideas until a permanent decision was reached.

At the same time, Linda Meehan attempted to enroll her son, Mitchell in a Kindergarten program in Sandown. She walked with her youngest two children up North Road to visit Jiminy Cricket Preschool at the home of Chris Higham. She was informed that there were no openings for Kindergarten in the fall. Therefore, Linda Meehan decided that a Kindergarten would need to be started to enable her son, Mitchell, to attend Kindergarten in the fall.

The first Kindergarten began with Mitchell and seven other students. Mitchell’s sister, Lily, who was three years old at the time, shared his preschool mat with Lily and therefore Lily attended Kindergarten for three years until she went to first grade in Sandown. Ann Lake was the Kindergarten teacher and Linda Meehan became her assistant.

Several years later, Linda Meehan saw the need for a preschool program and so the garage in her home was turned into a preschool room. By 1990, there were 34 students enrolled at Playmates Preschool and in 1991, there were 48 students.

A daycare space was later created in the barn of the house where two rooms and two bathrooms were designed for a daycare space. The daycare originally provided care for infants but within 6 months, Linda Meehan decided that it was too difficult for the staff to take excellent care of infants and the minimum daycare age was raised to two years and six months of age. Later, the daycare age was increased to three years old and the need to be potty trained.

In 1992, Linda Meehan received a Masters in Education from Lesley College in Creative Arts in Learning. During the same year, the school changed its name from Playmates Preschool to Playmates Learning Center to reflect the nature of its mission, to be a learning center for children.

In the summer of 1997, the daycare children would go to Seeley Park, the Sandown Town Beach, to cool off at the beach but it was proving too difficult to keep the children safe among all the children enjoying the beach. At the same time, Mitchell Mencis, was hoping that his family would build a swimming pool at their home for his family to use in the summer. Mitchell decided that he would contribute money he had invested in the stock market from money he received from his Bar Mitzvah toward the building of a swimming pool. A pool was installed behind our facility and an Aquatic Program began in the summer of 1998.

Mitchell Mencis was an avid athlete as he grew up, participating in basketball, soccer, baseball, skiing and tennis. His love of soccer inspired his family to create a soccer field behind Playmates Learning Center and in the summer of 2000, Mitchell created a soccer camp for young children. In the year 2004, 106 children participated in sports camps and 63 children participated in swim lessons. 140 children are currently being served during the school year in preschool, Kindergarten, daycare and Before & After School programs.

After two years of operating soccer camps, Mitchell expanded the summer camp programs to Cheerleading and in the summer of 2004, summer daycamps were held for soccer, cheerleading, field hockey, lacrosse and flag football. These new programs required the creation of Sandlot Sports & Entertainment in 2005 and we added a bandshell to our facilities. Now we were able to provide drama and musical theater to New Hampshire children.

Playmates Learning Center would also like to acknowledge the contribution made by Edward Mencis towards the creation and support of the center through the 20 years of it’s operation. He has contributed time and money towards the goals of the center and continues to plan for it’s growth.  Future plans include the creation of Sandy Pond which will enable us to include new recreational activities for our summer programs:

In the fall of 2007, the Timberlane Regional School District introduced public Kindergarten to the district and the first public Kindergarten classes began at Sandown North Elementary School. This was another transition for Playmates Learning Center. Fortunately, the town of Chester had not implemented public Kindergarten and so our private Kindergarten was still able to exist with Sandown and Chester students. In anticipation of reduced Kindergarten enrollment, Playmates Learning Center reduced it’s minimum age to 25 months and we began a toddler program.

A Playmates bus was added in the fall of 2008 and we now transport children to afternoon Kindergarten to Sandown North Elementary School. In the fall of 2009, we began offering transportation to Chester Academy for afternoon Kindergarten after Chester initiated their public Kindergarten program.