MISSION VIEJO : Afterschool Day Care for the Active

Beverly Woolley couldn’t bear the situation she saw eight years ago at some day-care centers, where children were trapped each day after school with little to do, unable even to enjoy a spur-of-the-moment bike ride or trip to the park.

“I grew up in the country, so I can’t stand the thought of kids just sitting around doing nothing. You’re only a kid once,” said Woolley, 40, who started the Afterschool Activity Club.

Woolley’s five neon-painted buses pick up children from 23 South County elementary schools and carry them each day to planned activities at local parks and beaches or their weekly baseball practices, ballet lessons and catechism classes.

And when they aren’t in the great outdoors, club members usually are engaged in some physical activity, like street hockey or wrestling matches at the small but versatile Marguerite Parkway day-care center, equipped with a game room, library, wood shop, lounge areas and even a makeshift racquetball court. Each day children are assigned to work in the center’s “bank” and “store,” where play money is exchanged for the afternoon snack. Occasional group projects also are planned, such as constructing wooden toy boats and racing them at Laguna Niguel Regional Park.

For long weekends and summer months, Woolley takes large groups of children on camping trips to the La Jolla American Indian Reservation and San Onofre campgrounds and off-road riding in the high desert.

During eight years of hiking, surfing, swimming and traveling with as many as 100 children between the ages of 5 and 14, Woolley said she has not had a single accident involving a child.

“We watch more closely than the lifeguards. We try to be very careful, plus we carry lots of insurance.”

But she’s had her share of close calls and difficulties.

Last month, a fire destroyed two rooms in the small center, including game tables, toys and furniture. Woolley was forced to make do with only one room until two weeks ago when repairs were completed. Although all damages were covered by fire insurance, Woolley gave a slight shudder at the thought of what could have happened.

“The kids were bummed after it happened. But they all handled it pretty well. Luckily it happened on a weekend when no one was around,” she said.

The fire occurred during remodeling of the facility, part of Woolley’s attempts to expand the facility to include more children. She hopes one day to open a second facility farther south--in San Clemente or San Juan Capistrano--but a recent attempt to buy an old farmhouse on Ortega Highway was thwarted by nearby residents who complained about potential noise and additional traffic.

And recently her biggest problem has been rising gas prices, which have caused fuel costs for her buses to almost double.

But even with these problems, Woolley has been able to keep the cost of her center at $60 a week per child plus $2.50 for each trip to sports practices and lessons. The children help cut the costs of the program by holding an ongoing recycling drive and occasional car washes and other fund-raisers.

Woolley, who has two young children herself, said her main goal is to help working parents and their children enjoy the same freedoms that non-working parents can give their children.

“Not all parents have the luxury of picking up their children from school each day. But at least the parents know their kids aren’t miserable, sitting doing nothing,” Woolley said. “And even though their parents work (children) should still be able to be a kid, explore and learn things.”