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      Achievement First

      Engaged Employer

      Achievement First reviews

      3.0

      35% would recommend to a friend

      (998 total reviews)
      avatar

      Fatimah Barker

      39% approve of CEO

      21% positive business outlook

      Ratings by demographic groups

      Achievement First has an employee rating of 3.0 out of 5 stars, based on 998 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an average working experience there. The Achievement First employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Education industry (3.7 stars).

      Reviews by job title

      998 reviews
      1.0
      Dec 7, 2017

      Crazy AF

      Founding teacher
      Recommend
      CEO approval
      Business Outlook

      Pros

      + Salary + Smart/high functioning co-workers

      Cons

      - No one trusts teachers - Very negative culture (teachers are trained to be mean to kids) - Suspensions are used to push students they cannot control out - Students and parents are NOT respected/trusted

      avatar
      Achievement First Response
      8y
      Thank you for your sharing this review. Although your insight is incredibly alarming, I would be grateful for the chance to follow-up and learn more. I’m going to respond broadly to some of the content in your review in order to shed light on our larger organization for other reviewers – but my response is not meant to demean your personal truth or experience. I am incredibly eager to hear more about your experience. Your review is anonymous but you can reach me at tomkaiser@achievementfirst.org. Yelling at kids is NOT a part of our coaching playbook. We are big believers in strong voice and “warm/demanding” tone (as described by Lisa Delpit) but yelling in a kids face is inappropriate and disrespectful (at best). No argument can be made otherwise. Student investment is a network-wide priority at AF next year and we’re making a major investment in a new approach to social-emotional learning (thanks to a partnership with Valor Collegiate Academies). It is a critical part of our mission if we’re serious about preparing kids for college success (and we are). We’ve actively worked to reduce suspensions, and cut the number of suspensions in half at AF over the last three years. They are not used as a tool to actively push kids out. We have lower student attrition rates than many of our district peers and we replace any scholar that we lose to make sure that we’re still serving the community to the fullest extent that we can. The people at AF (the students, parents, and teachers) are the lifeblood of our organization. Without them, we do not exist. With their deep partnership, we can create something spectacular. This was obviously not your experience and I would relish the opportunity to learn more.
      2.0
      Mar 30, 2017

      Not great, Bob!

      Anonymous employee
      Recommend
      CEO approval
      Business Outlook

      Pros

      - Plentiful supplies (copy paper, markers) and decent technology (doc cams, Chrome books). - Network support writes comprehensive unit plans for most subjects. - If you have little to no experience in education and/or low-income communities, you'll probably be pretty happy here.

      Cons

      - It's like working for Dolores Umbridge, minus the intentional physical scars. - As you can tell from the lengthy rebuttals to reviews by the Chief Talent Officer here: Those who disagree ought not to be believed. - Lack of adequate differentiation and special education services is widely seen as a minor inconvenience, rather than morally repugnant, completely contrary to the stated mission, and - oh, right - illegal. - The ambivalence about differentiation extends to professional development as well. School-wide PD spent hours on first-year classroom management skills, which should have been taught in coaching sessions. Requests for more rigorous PD were rebuffed. - Admin had a superficial understanding of "high expectations" and "rigor." It translated to rigid behavioral expectations and teaching out-of-reach content. (I was directed to have my entire class *independently* read a level X book when the average reading level was an R/S and only 2 students were at X or above.) - Due to these rigid, school-wide, mandated behavior systems, it was not that uncommon to see 10% of the students (or more!) removed from class and it was not unusual for those removals to last more than an hour. - A surprising proportion of men in administration compared to the proportion of men in teaching roles.

      avatar
      Achievement First Response
      9y
      Dearest reviewer – I’m glad to see that your sense of humor is intact, though I’ll admit I had to google both the Harry Potter and Mad Men reference (full disclosure: I spent ten years in AF middle school and never read a Harry Potter). We do absolutely embrace a school-wide / all-team approach to school culture. It sounds like there were many students removed from your class, which I agree is troubling (and I’m sure not unique across AF), but I do want people to know that we watch removal rates carefully across the network because there’s little that’s more important than keeping kids in class and the average across AF is nowhere near that high. In most of our schools, less than 3% of students are removed from class per day – and even that is a number we consider high and that we’re actively working on. It’s extremely sad to read that your perspective is that special education services are seen as a “minor inconvenience” at AF. I cannot speak for your school and don’t know which one you work at – though I can verify that we’ve had at least 2 schools this year where serious concerns about current special education support have been raised and they are taken seriously. The commitment to special education runs deep here. We have directors of special education that support every region, and in NY next year we are starting an entire new academy for the kids that we’re having the hardest time reaching - AF Bushwick Empower Program. Empower will be a very small, specialized program within one of our existing schools where students will receive tailored academic support in small groups. With very small class sizes and qualified special education teachers, we’re confident that Empower will give our students with disabilities the instruction they need to reach their fullest potential. I would greatly appreciate it if you could reach out to me to share more about your experience, in part to know whether your school is one that we’re already focused on. -Tom Kaiser, Chief Talent Officer tomkaiser@achievementfirst.org
      1.0
      Dec 16, 2016

      Terrible place to work. Doing more harm to students of color than help

      Anonymous employee
      Recommend
      CEO approval
      Business Outlook

      Pros

      There are none. Useless professional development. Lack of knowledge of the community. No parental involvement.

      Cons

      Doing their part to strengthen the school-to-prison pipeline. If parent really knew how their children were handled in this school, there would be no students left.

      Viewing 31 - 33 of 998 Reviews
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