Today we’d like to introduce you to Trista Stamness.
Hi Trista, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
Why start a preschool?
My story was definitely not planned, but evolved as a notion when my son, our last child, was about age 3. This was about 11 years ago and at the time, I had two older daughters who were middle school age who had been through preschool with adequate experiences. Due to my son being very much interested in building and creating things like roads, airports and towers, etc. I started looking for a place with more hands on STEM or STEAM for younger scholars age 3-5. I also wanted more outdoor play with intentional emphasis on building early literacy skills; my wish was for a place with no glass ceilings on learning and MORE than simply caring for kids.
It was 2015 and I simply didn’t feel there was an option in Rochester, MN which matched my vision, my wishes for my son or expectations of knowledge growth. My hope was to find a place which truly had higher thinking skills built into their scope and sequence of topics to learn about rather than simply learning colors, shapes or themes. My dream was more of an apprenticeship model to build knowledge in young kids while allowing time for deliberate practice after showing kids how to get creative with building and/or using their fine motor skills in unique ways for example creating art while researching artists or other interesting topics.
Initially my hope was simply to find a place that leveraged learning for young scholars by building strong vocabulary on adult level topics to build knowledge and increase later needed reading skilsl for the long term. This hope is when my story started. It was the metacognitive work I was doing while pondering options for my son as I was working as a consultant for schools and traveling nationally to work to increase knowledge for other Pre to K-12 grade students.
Once I started thinking about my vision for an engaging preschool which fosters kids to grow and having no current perfect options for the dream school I wanted for my son, I decided to ponder this notion to open an academy with much more seriousness. I started to visualize and dream a bit.
So, at this time, I was traveling across the nation working as a staff developer for schools. My focus of work was turning around school systems for better learning with a focus on using a research model learning around science and social studies to build literacy skills students can leverage later in adult life. Because my focus was on building stronger instructional systems in schools to ultimately increase reading achievement in the earliest years especially by grade 3, I thought, why not create a more modern preschool for my son in Rochester, MN which would focus on more scholarly talk. Such as metamorphosis or revolution or rotation or when studying the human body use the terms skeletal or circulatory system. This became the brainstorming for our STEM preschool in Rochester, MN. I truly thought and believed Rochester needed and was the perfect place for something like this. Rochester professionals embrace investing in their child as most parents do.
So from the start in the fall of 2015 when I was traveling 2-3 days a week for my consulting work, I had free time in the evenings or days at home. This is when I started writing the scope and sequence and studied the statutes of MN. But, how this happened was a little more than these first baby steps of metacognitive thinking. The vast professional working capital of skills I gained in my early professional years was a HUGE part of why I was able to create this niche of a school. I have been fortunate and always embraced acquiring many skills throughout my professional journey, having learned and been apprenticed by other experts in the field built knowledge. This was another reason to simply start up a preschool. I wanted to use my knowledge and skills to “pay it forward” to serve the Rochester and surrounding Southern Minnesota communities by creating an exemplary preschool for our future leaders. I knew Rochester parents would seek to invest in their child and I wanted to serve all the professional parents who desire an exemplary place of learning for their child each and everyday. As this is exactly what I wanted for my son as a working professional! I wanted parents to feel comfortable, confident, and happy about leaving their child in our learning space to foster knowledge building. I knew each parent would be excited to pick up their child to hear about all their daily adventures. For example, most recently, one of our young scholars said “dad, did you know we breathe oxygen into our lungs?” and later “teacher, what do red blood cells do?” THIS IS STEM! It is more than building something. It is cognitive thinking, too!
Initially, as owner, I was always seeking quality in every decision. So what should we name the learning lab? I wanted to be intentional on the name. I wanted to be more than just a name, but a true meaning behind it. So I started brainstorming words which would be a great fit for my vision. Once I had a couple ideas, I shared my name with just one professional friend and my husband. EPIC Endeavors Academy was picked.
So what is behind the EPIC Endeavors Academy name? I wanted it to be more for young scholars in Rochester, MN. I mean, we do have the renowned Mayo Clinic. So we should be able to offer MORE to preschool age scholars. EPIC seemed appropriate and an academy seemed to be appropriate as an academy is known to expand art, science, and literature. This type of offering is most certainly is what I wanted. I wanted it to be a place of enrichment; I was wishing for a place where it can be endless learning. EPIC, like it states, add greater value or significance. I wanted this for my child and couldn’t find it.
Why the word Endeavors? Truly I had a vision or dream to create readers before kindergarten as I knew how to expose young kids to great early literacy. I had learned more about literacy and felt we could build a program with a conscious effort to get many books read to young scholars and build in purposeful learning activities for deliberate practice to grow their skills. I wanted this effort of skill building to be something a child would leverage later in their early elementary years well on into college and also adult life; when they become a musician, scientist, biologist, architect, or mathematician. I wanted to affect a child’s future in a positive way!
Initially, the thought of me as an owner made me feel a bit of pressure. I felt all the decisions needed to be made to be purpose and hold high standards of quality. This meant once we determined our name, then our space and location, we needed to determine our niche color choice as the design of our wall color was intentional. I wanted it to be place where it feels exciting to be and more important parents would seek to come.
In brief, January 2016 we determined our two classroom learning lab space. I had an architect sketch drawn to remodel. He listened to my vision and I showed him my 4 colors I really wanted. The colors of our walls were intentional, too.
*Small pops of hot pink were for energy, confidence, feeling of excitement and playfulness.
*Wall pops of lime green for vitality and creativity as well as associating with nature, happiness, and creativity.
*Darker bright blue is calming associated with the sea and confidence.
*Light gray to give a soothing and relaxing feel with much professionalism, intellect and sophistication.
Feb to July we started turning the walls into colorful learning spaces. My husband and 3 kids all helped paint, drop advertising literature off in neighborhoods. During this time, I started a Facebook page and started to post about a STEM preschool starting for fall 2016. In April and May of 2016, as our space was still in the remodel phase, I met with interested parents at a local coffee shop to learn more about our new vision for our STEM Academy. I believe I signed up about 5 kids at a coffee shop by the end of May.
This EPIC dream, or blow your hair back kind of goal, to create a top level learning space for kids was unfolding and REAL. From consulting I had learned there is nothing better than watching an exemplary teacher develop a learning environment that is a student center with focus or purpose on learning every day. Often the environment and knowledge of professional development can make all the difference. Over the years I have seen a vast amount of great and exemplary classrooms, schools, and districts. What separates the good from the great or even exemplary is purposeful instruction and focus on building an environment of “thinking” and students who are “thinkers”. Students soar when teachers raise their expectations and modeling or shift their mindset to have “no limits” to what a child can learn and will learn or what age.
By July 2016 we were licensed and had our first few kids start attending during the summer for our summer camp offering. I had hired and trained our first teachers, asst. teachers and aide. By the end of August 2016, we had a full classroom of students signed up to start our first year of EPIC preschool with most of them being full time. In September of 2016 we officially started our first preschool classroom with 20 kids. 2 years later we housed 45-60 families a year both part time and full time preschool options. We currently have about 700 families we have served. From the beginning, I was consulting and traveling nationally delivering staff development 2-3 days a week. So it was very natural for me to coach or model in our classroom for our staff then leave for a few days. I managed the HR, office, advertising and training of staff. But truly I simply shared my vision with my staff, modeled the “big ideas” of what I wanted to happen in the schedule of the day. Looking back, it was the best way to apprentice a team of EPIC building leaders. I was gone a few days a week, they could make daily decisions without me. Over the years, with the exception of the years 2020 & 2021, I have always traveled nationally for a few days for my consulting business. They all stepped up to lead in the beginning and always have known I will check in and support them. So myself, together with our EPIC team, created EPIC Endeavors Academy.
We are soon going to celebrate our 10 year anniversary of us opening EPIC Endeavors Academy! It feels surreal! I have paused many times at different moments over the 10 years to simply whisper, “Thank you God!” I feel blessed. As I think back to earlier in my professional start, prior to opening EPIC Endeavors Academy, I often said a prayer, “God please expand my borders and broaden my territory.” Having met so many professional people from around the world through our academy, with some years having 8+ different languages spoken in our Academy, I definitely believe our territory is broad!
I love the EPIC environment we have created. It has been incredible sharing friendship and joy among so many traditions and cultures around the world. We have most definitely created an EPIC family around the world and embraced each moment!
So, go for it if your heart is tugging you to do something. My goal was a blow your hair back kind of goal and I have no regrets!
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
It hasn’t been a perfectly smooth road, but I think hiring made all the difference helping it go more smoothly in the beginning. I had very dependable people who were loving our mission for our preschool. They were very passionate and excited to be part of the team to kick off this EPIC preschool idea.
I think one of the biggest challenges right away was wearing so many hats from talking with banker, to hiring and leading or training staff, creating our policies and initial systems, to the bookkeeping and basic day to day things like creating the staff schedule, etc. I quickly realized I needed to embrace the learning curve on the marketing; especially social media marketing, building a website from scratch, and to getting our name out there, etc. As I knew I couldn’t keep doing it all. Soon, I realized you need to let go, allowing teacher can step up to lead and soar. Looking back, I learned so MUCH fast!
And of course, looking back, probably the biggest curve ball challenge in the 10 years, as others probably also faced, was definitely March 2020, the start of COVID and the shut downs. While most people were getting furloughed, we had professionals needing care. I decided if I wanted to keep my business, I had to be nimble and adjust! We got creative and started zoom nights right away to keep everything as normal as possible during abnormal times. Later in the summer, we adjusted and turned a classroom into a school age room to support our families with siblings who wanted help with online learning and remaining in a small community for extra enrichment. This actually went quite smoothly when I look back, but at the time, it was quite stressful. After a month in, our family started to turn off TV or news. We read about news instead of watching the news. It helps keep calm during the storm. We could create the tone of the message. I remember when our first staff said they had COVID. I had minutes to determine our best next step. Luckily it was right before Thanksgiving break. We ended up closing for 14 days, but most of it was during our already scheduled holiday break. Then, I simply tried to make it right for our families and offered to stay open more of our scheduled winter break so any missed days could be made up. I wanted to make sure we as a business “made it right” for our families who were paying tuition. After these few years, I now look back and often joke the word “uff da” from my family’s heritage took on a whole new meaning for me.
Generally our business runs smooth most of the time, as we continue to seek growth through staff development holding ourselves to high standards and quality. I often simply send a “thank you” text when I see a staff member doing something which brings about quality. I also coach everyone to be nimble; to be ok with adjusting. Giving “shout outs” for anyone going above and beyond or executing an amazing lesson also is a way we like to thank our staff. Both ideas seem to create a positive environment for staff to seek to be EPIC in our daily work which helps us respond to daily or weekly demands smoothly.
Being nimble is a strong quality for leading staff forward. Lessons learned during times of tiny trials often creates a better, more efficient system. So keeping things running smooth is something we all strive for.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I have been a sought after teacher, leader, and staff developer both locally and nationally. I bring 30+ years of experience and expertise getting high academic results with ALL learners. I have taught preschool-adults and continue to partner with schools as an executive coach to assist building organic authentic reading cultures within Pre K-12th grade and purposeful instructional platforms to get high personalized learning outcomes within any level of the school system.
I am most proud to have coached 3 MN schools to earn Reward School Status from the Minnesota Department of Education as well as building young educational leaders in many school districts across the nation. And, I am also very proud to have accomplished all this while also creating a start up EPIC preschool that gets results. Many kids leave EPIC preschool reading before kindergarten.
I am definitely known for my staff development work of turning around reading and math in schools, especially K-6. I specialize in growing professional learning communities to be results oriented. My expertise in curriculum and instruction come from my expertise both as a teacher and instructional consultant. I have experience in elementary, middle school and high school which is not typical. So this tends to be my niche as I can see system needs and help create staff development appropriate for all teachers and leaders at all levels.
I live by a few different quotes.
I believe there should be “no glass ceiling on learning and knowledge at any age!”
I often say, “you can have excuses or you can have results, but you can’t have both.”
I tell my own kids, and students in classrooms I have coached, “nobody can want something more than you.”
Last, I believe in holding others to high expectations, but more importantly I hold those same expectations for myself.
So maybe we end on discussing what matters most to you and why?
Family time and enjoying big and small life moments! Much of my sport love includes: downhill and water skiing, snowmobiling, basketball, volleyball, and walks outside.
But most of all I cherish my time with my family and friends, especially escaping to the lake during our Minnesota summer. Lake life brings about a sense of peace and calm. It allows everyone to slow down and enjoy the day or night. Simply allows you to take in the beauty of the surroundings. Listening to the loons or hearing the waves hit the beach can be mindful and a time to replenish our energy.
I really believe we need to take time to pause and rest so we can give more in other areas such as to family, work or community. I know taking time to pause and finding quiet time helps me to rejuvenate my creativity and build new ideas.
Pricing:
- Preschool 5 half days 8:00-12:00=Monthly tuition rate $590.00
- Preschool full day 5 days 7:00-5:30=Monthly tuition rate $1,475.00
- School or Business Consulting fees based on number of day packages. Text if you are interested. 507-319-5709
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.epicendeavorsacademy.com/staff
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/epicendeavorspreschoolacademy/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61571761824206
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/trista-stamness-8312209/
