History

Priska Welbers is the founder and owner of IMAGO DEI Child Care. She holds a Master’s degree in Christian Education from Talbot School of Theology (Biola University), California, and has served as a youth pastor for several years. Before that, she worked with children for over ten years. After taking an Early Childhood Education course (with an emphasis on the Reggio Emilia approach) at MTI Community College in Vancouver, she worked for more than three years as a teacher in a preschool, in Strong Start, and in an after-school program and continued her studies of the Reggio Emilia approach by taking more courses.

She thoroughly enjoyed working in those settings and now wants to combine her two passions and run a Christian child care.

More and more preschools and child care centres embrace the postmodern approach in their teaching, which encourages children to express themselves and find their uniqueness. While this is a good start, it is missing an important aspect: our true self can only be found in God.

Priska desires to invest in and prepare the next generation for the many challenges ahead. Therefore, she wants to help children to not only find their uniqueness, but also to gain a healthy self image which is based not on themselves but on a relationship with a God Who created them with all their uniqueness and gifts.

Combining Priska’s passion for Christian Education and Early Childhood Education, IMAGO DEI will support families, and the church, in raising children with a Christian worldview in this postmodern culture. Teachers will use the emergent approach and the Bible in guiding children to discover and explore the world. This will be one of the first such educational centres in Greater Vancouver.

The name “IMAGO DEI” means “the image of God”. Every child is unique, created fearfully and wonderfully by God in His image.

Genesis 1:27
God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.

Psalm 139:14
I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, and my soul knows it very well.

Therefore, by the grace of God, IMAGO DEI Child Care will help to shape all areas of children’s lives so that they reflect His image intellectually, morally and relationally.