Lydia Weeks’ favorite place to hang out is with Super Why. Her mom, Monique Weeks, brings Lydia, 2, to Super Why’s place — also known as WSRE’s Imagination Station. “I like that it’s free, it’s clean, and they have tons of toys, different toys that we don’t have buy,” says Monique Weeks with a laugh. “She talks about this place all the time and on Sunday she’s like, ‘Mom, we go see Super Why?’” The center is basically PBS programming come to life. Many of the characters and educational themes come to life through interactive games, touchscreen computers and toys. The team behind the project, led by Jill Hubbs, WSRE’s director of education and outreach, has worked to make it a place that parents can enjoy too. At Imagination Station, Weeks, recently transplanted to Pensacola by the U.S. Air Force, reads to Lydia, sometimes while sitting in a small fire truck, one of the many unique ways parents may interact with their little ones. Imagination Station is a one-of-kind interactive, PBS learning center that opened at the Community Maritime Park stadium in 2013. Since then, there have been more than 16,000 visitors. It is open Monday, Wednesday and Friday to the public and during Pensacola Blue Wahoos baseball games. Hubbs designed the activity center with preschoolers in mind, but parents are very much welcome. “It’s a great way for parents and kids to come into a relaxed atmosphere and spend time reading together or playing with the dinosaurs or doing the touchscreen computers too,” says Hubbs, who taught kindergarten and first grade for years. The center shares space with the Pensacola State College Learning Lab and a baseball museum that allows visitors to see the memorabilia collected during WSRE’s making of the documentary “Baseball in Pensacola.” Local learning centers, Head Start providers, ARC and other groups use it for enrichment. Its profile may have been low, but it is growing daily. It has even gained national attention. Last October, the project won the National Educational Telecommunications Association award for Community Engagement Based on a Local Project. At the NETA conference in October in Tampa, Hubbs will speak about Imagination Station. She also has been invited to speak about the project at an annual PBS meeting in Austin in May. “Parents are so grateful, we get thanked constantly, and then they bring their friends, so it’s a good feeling,” Hubbs says. “It’s also good because it makes people realize what WSRE does. Our mission is education. We’re committed to our community, and it’s just a great way to showcase that.”

A needed community resource

Growing commitment to lifelong learning