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The Growing Academy

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The Growing Academy Reviews

2.9

41% would recommend to a friend

(19 total reviews)

40% positive business outlook

The Growing Academy has an employee rating of 2.9 out of 5 stars, based on 19 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an average working experience there.

Reviews by job title

19 reviews
1.0
2 Jan 2024

SPEECHLESS

Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

1) Fun-loving colleagues that are generally have good relationships with one another. However sadly many left or planning to do so. 2)Good job title for your CV

Cons

A few that I can think of out of the many : 1)A company with minimal structure in terms of admin/hr procedures. Bosses seems like they can do WHATEVER they want/like to employees based on their emotions and bias ness since they are the founders of the company itself. A few examples are terminating staff with no valid reasons to justify the extend of such decision. Another example is handing over warning letter to staff without following proper HR steps such as to first have 1:1 counselling session with staff and verbal warning, followed by a letter warning and then termination if needed. Instead they jump straight to the point and give letter for unjustifiable reasons. 2)When bosses are unhappy with you, they tend to gang up with their management team in a bullying manner and their approach towards staff is NOT professional. They tend to gaslight staff, raise their voice, make assumptions, vent anger on staff, and have a defensive attitude when staff voice up. The issue with bosses is that they will ONLY listen to the management team (bias) but not the ground staff. And the reason given by one of the boss on why certain action is taken, her reply was so that staff fear them. 3)Bosses would do whatever it takes to cut costs from staff benefits. For example, when staff exceeded their MC, instead of letting them use up their Annual Leave, bosses told staff to take it as Unpaid leave instead reason being to avoid confusion and make it easier for their accountant to make calculations. It is ironic as they are the one that said for us to use our leave first in such cases in meeting. Another example is trying to cut staff benefits such as medical the moment they resign (before their last day). 4)Lack of communication between the management team themselves. Hence, no communication with ground staff. Staff only get news or updates at the very last minute for example when classes have new kids, there are times when teachers only know on the day itself when the kid arrives. And lack of background information on the kids even when clarifying with bosses. Or even when new staff join us or when staff resigns, ground staff were not made aware till the very last minute. 5)The standard of their training doesn’t justify the 5K bond at all. It’s the biggest scam by far as the training provided is as good as any normal on-the-job training other company provides. They have a trainer and she too is clearly not qualified to be a trainer with no proper training background. The training provided is confusing (all over the place) and it’s very basic instead of in-depth theory. A week of training followed by assessing you once in a while while giving you demoralising condescending remarks. The fact that remarks were given despite the quality of lack of training. Google teaches us more clearly than the training TGA provides. If your hopes is for them to sent you for proper legitimate courses, keep your hopes low. They will probably only do so once you hit your one year bond and even so, you need to sign another bond if you want those training. It’s never to your benefit, it’s for theirs. Only one party benefits from all of this. 6)The work schedule daily feels like you are running a marathon. It’s a very chaotic situation daily, for example, due to low manpower, classes often combine into one. This means 2 to 3 teachers managing 30 plus special needs children. Or even one teacher with 15 plus children and one childminder. Despite all of this, management still has the nerve to question why staff feel burnt out or keep falling sick. Even question staff knowledge and quality in managing when staff were the one keeping centre running daily , the irony. Management /bosses themselves can’t manage the chaos when they are on ground and feel tired easily when managing. But despite experiencing it and seeing the chaos, they still refuse to accept the real problems. Low manpower with high number of students, they told us to lie to parents about the student to teacher ratio, means they are very well aware of the issues. And even with proper manpower, they are all new staff who is still undergoing the so call training. At times new staffs don’t even get training after first few months of joining as they are needed to child mind instead to replace the lack of manpower. 7)The appreciation bosses have for their staff is the bare minimum. They see each of their staff just as a replaceable employee instead of valuing the contributions the staff give to the company. When staff resign, they don’t even officially announce nor do they acknowledge the staff resignation letter. No thank you or goodbye even. That says a lot about the culture there. 8)Bosses tend to portray a super defensive attitude when feedback is being given to them and have an agenda towards the staff when feedback is given. To them, it is always staff issues, not them. That is why many staff lose trust in approaching them for anything. 9)High number of staff complained that their psychological and physical health deteriorated a lot ever since they joined this company due to various reasons. The turnover rate is super high for a reason despite them making staff sign bonds. 10)Many times staff will have to defend their rights by checking with MOM themselves as bosses tend to not follow proper procedures. The contract provided is very vague with minimal details, making it difficult for staff to defend themselves when needed. 11)Bosses seems nice face to face but when you start giving constructive feedbacks, defend for your rights, or when anyone from management team start targeting you, that is when they will portray their true colours. 12)Bosses care more for the gram and perfect looking pictures to post on social media rather than the child real life experience itself. It’s a facade for marketing purposes. It’s understandable, but when it’s excessive and real motive/goal is just to show how perfect everything is (burying all the probs/mess/lying to parents the teacher student ratio etc ) then it starts to question the company moral and value. 13)Bosses tends to give staff falls hope and promises. Twist and turn their words for example promising to give you some form of benefit example bonus but giving u the very bare minimum.

1.0
29 Aug 2023

Disappointing.

Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Some good colleagues that have are all leaving or left. Pay is not bad if you are willing to sacrifice your moral compass.

Cons

- Management will criticise your work (lesson plan) after it happens instead of vetting and giving feedback before so that changes can be made. - Hence, the training bond is useless. They don’t even want to sit down with you to discuss how to make better lesson plans, how can they possibly think that their training bond of $5k is worth it. You hire someone with the promise (in black and white) that you will teach us how to do lesson plans, IEP and behaviour management. But it was not given. - Constant lack of manpower. Would stretch their staff thin and they wonder why people keep taking mc and falling sick. - Therapists timeline daily is crazy: teach group classes twice a day, 1:1 sessions, operations like change diapers, shower, lunch time, snack time. Childminding in between all the activities. - ON TOP OF that, we have to finish our lesson materials. Design, print, cut, laminate etc etc. With what time? None. They don’t give you time to do anything and expect things to be done. Oh, and also daily updates regarding the Group Therapy and Classroom Time for each child. They don’t give you time to do all these. They will just expect you to. - Some items in the school is not safe and requires constant supervision. Management love to buy pretty but not practical things for kids with special needs AND expect us to be the one to keep an eye on the kids. Make sure they don’t destroy it or hurt themselves. Here’s a suggestion, keep the things away from the kids.

1.0
13 Dec 2023
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

- good colleagues (excluding management) who left (more than 10+ left this year) or are leaving - lunch break 1h15mins - pay increment is okay

Cons

1. Constant lack of manpower - management and seniors will tell us to lie to parents that the classroom ratio (teacher to student) is 3:12. In reality, with people constantly leaving and management adding more kids, the classroom ratio is 2:15, and even 2:18 on some days when teacher MC. It is challenging for teachers/childminders or even anyone to watch over a large group of special needs kids. However, they continue to pump more kids in when there is no quality with the number of new teachers coming in. Not to mention there is no training provided for new staff. New staff are expected to watch the children and spend half of their time only child minding. And when we are unable to manage these special needs kids, the blame would fall on us. 2. No proper training - as mentioned by ALL the other reviews, there is no proper training worth 5k while you work here. IEP, and lesson planning ‘training’ are all done 1 or 2 weeks before the deadline. Oh not to mentioned that bosses also said that changing of diaper and clothes is also included in the 5k training. They only put that in because they have such a high turnover rate and need manpower (which they are still unable to get despite this business being a SPED school - is this ethical?). 3. Very hectic schedule with no real breaks in between - therapists daily timeline is insane (group classes twice a day, changing clothes/diapers, feeding the kids lunch/snack time and childmind during the free times in between the schedule) on top of constant lack of manpower and false promises of more support. Not to mention we have to also send DAILY communication comm logs when other sped schools or preschools only send it once a month. Not to mention lesson materials which have to be prepared as well. Everything is expected to be done by a deadline but there is no proper time given. 4. Safety management is questionable - for example, whenever there is an accident (e.g. a child who has been injured) or situation, management's priority is to inform the parent of the kids so that they are not annoyed/angry at the school, not because to inform whether the child is actually fine. They would let the staff handle the situation by getting us to send the message to the parents - even if the staff doesn’t know how to handle it, No follow-up to check if the staff is affected by the situation or any discussion. Overall, there is NO proper structure in this company - no HR or any proper procedures e.g. proper induction/staff development/training/staff leaving. Decisions made seem to be always given out on the day or last minute and NOT discussed with the staff (only the management team) and yet they expect us to be okay with it when management is not even working on the floors. Everything done is for the aesthetic and “for the gram” as quoted by bosses, so believe what you will. Also, good luck if you are posted to the most burnt-out and overworked centre because they left it there to burn and are continuing to add more children.

Viewing 1 - 3 of 19 Reviews

Glassdoor has 20 The Growing Academy reviews submitted anonymously by The Growing Academy employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if The Growing Academy is right for you.