Image from Linda Hynes

By Chris Brown

From Desjardins Insurance and Crystal Metz

Little Explorers Preschool owner honoured to get $10,000 grant

Apr 25, 2021 | 9:35 AM

MEDICINE HAT, AB – There are some big smiles at Little Explorers Preschool this weekend thanks to a Medicine Hat insurance agent.

Crystal Metz of Crystal Metz insurance presented Little Explorers with a cheque for $10,000. The funds come from Desjardins Insurance’s GoodSpark Small Business Grants Program. Metz is an agent for Desjardins.

Linda Hynes, owner/operator of Little Explorers says she is honoured to receive the funds as there are a lot of worthy small businesses in the community who have been hit hard by COVID-19.

She says the money will be split a few ways, including to help a family who could use help with the fees.

“I have a family selected for the fall that I will cover some of their preschool fees so that their child can attend more,” says Hynes.

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She says she’ll also upgrade a temporary classroom to make it a permanent one, will look at new office equipment and will get more materials for the children.

Metz chose Little Explorers for the grant after seeing first-hand the lengths Hynes went to to stay connected to the kids when she was forced to shut down last March.

Hynes kept in touch with virtual songs, gave weekly craft ideas, drive-by parades and helped the kids celebrate Mother’s Day and Father’s Day.

She also wrote about 100 letters, she says.

“One of the hardest things about the shutdown was not being to see goodbye or a proper goodbye to those kids moving on to Kindergarten,” Hynes says. “Some of them had been here for two or three years so I wrote letters to all of my kids the ones that returning and the ones that are moving on.”

Metz has one child at the preschool now and two have been through previously.

“She was so positive and she kept communicating with students through Facebook live and everything,” says Metz. “It really helped the children as well have a sense of normalcy where they could see their teacher on a regular basis even though their world had really changed abruptly.”