Pros
I loved my coworkers. They were all very creative and caring people
Cons
The pay is abysmal, and for someone with AMI Montessori training, I found there to be significant lack of quality in the Montessori aspect of Guidepost. I worked at two different locations and both emphasized the aesthetics over the actual philosophy. Guidepost's business strategy seems to be to take early childhood ed workers from traditional daycares, offer them slightly better pay (which isn't hard since early childhood pays crap as a general field), then slap a little bit of in-house Montessori training on them and shove them into a classroom. Most folks are really overwhelmed and don't have enough support to follow through on the philosophy. I saw so much stuff that undermined Montessori philosophy, like punishments/rewards, and mostly just a complete lack of knowledge, training, or experience of employees. Guidepost seems to be most interested in quantity, not quality. This is directly contradictory to Montessori philosophy. It seems like Guidepost is just a place for investors to park money in real estate, tbh. I don't think Higher Ground cares AT ALL about Montessori. They definitely don't care about COVID and they will not pay you if you're sick. There is no sick pay--you have to use your PTO. And if you're a new employee with no PTO, you have to take unpaid time off if you get sick. They will never close classrooms when there is COVID, and in my experience they don't even tell you if someone gets COVID. It felt incredibly unsafe and I did not feel cared for or considered as a professional or a human being. AND! If you say you have a limit or boundary around work, they tell you that you "lack the energy necessary for a startup company" and imply that you don't care or you're weak because you don't want to work yourself sick for their profit.