10,000 local kids have been educated at USU Child Development Lab – Cache Valley Daily

Kelli Barker, director of the Child Development Lab, and Shelley Lindauer, former director of the lab and emeritus faculty of HDFS. Photo courtesy of Utah State University.

LOGAN – Utah State University’s Child Development Lab, where 10,000 local children have been educated since the 1940s, is literally an institution within an institution.

Known as the Adele and Dale Young Child Development Laboratory, it is part of the Emma Eccles Jones College of Education and Human Services.

The lab was established as part of the College of Family Life. With a generous donation from the Young family, a portion of the basement of the historic Family Life Building on the Quad was remodeled and the lab thrives there to this day.

Faculty of the Human Development and Family Studies Department direct the lab today. Every semester 100 children are enrolled in one of three labs, which are organized by age and serve the children in morning and afternoon sessions.

Children are provided with their own hands-on learning experiences and they are allowed to make choices for themselves.

For more than 80 years the lab’s guiding philosophy has been an emphasis on play, and it is where future early childhood educators receive hands-on training.

Lab Co-Director Kelli Barker said it is phenomenal to see the growth of sophomores as practicum students and then as seniors doing student teaching.

To learn more about the lab and to enroll your child, visit Child Development Laboratory.