Little Lights Childcare Center is opening a second location at 7613 Hospital Drive in Gloucester, between Riverside Walter Reed Hospital and Commonwealth Senior Living at Gloucester House.

Little Lights’ main location is at 4299 George Washington Memorial Highway, Hayes, as part of the LightHouse Church campus.

Opening a new early childhood education center was spearheaded by Dawn Norville’s mission to create more affordable child care facility openings for the community, particularly for low-income families.

Norville began her preschool career with Little Lights in 2012 after college. In 2019, she accepted another position to assist in a different program. She left the other facility last summer with the goal of creating a new operation that could help combat growing child care facility waitlists in the community.

In the fall, Deirdre Lund, executive director at Gloucester House, offered Norville a space adjacent to the senior living facility that had sat unused since the...