inclusive, supportive environment - Instructor Langsford Learning Acceleration Centers Employee Review

When I started looking at Langsford Learning Centers, I was looking for a stress free job that would allow me to help my surrounding community, and although I had no idea how I wanted to do it, I just knew that I wanted to help people. After seeing that i met the requirements to work at Langsford, which was basically to have a Bachelor’s degree and be willing to work 4-6 hours per week on a consistent basis, I sent in my resume and availability to the indicated email on the Langsford site. Everything after that was great. After talking to the director of the center, I found that Langsford mission matched very well with my need to serve the community. I was also intrigued by their unique methodology of instruction which in my opinion is second to none! As someone who learned English as a second language, I gained very much through their intensive training. I say intensive not to ward people off but to say that it is very important, beneficial, practical, and interesting. I loved that Langsford not only created for me a love for kids and teaching, it gave me confidence that I could carry into many other aspects of my life, which I absolutely needed a few years out of college. I am proud to say that I am now pursuing a Master’s in Education and plan to continue working with children and teens. For me it was a life changing experience which I am forever thankful for and I still do my best to keep in touch with the staff today. The staff is very likable and willing to answer any questions you may have, especially while you are still learning the Langsford way of teaching. You will not annoy anyone by asking questions as that is the only way to get better at this job that is very relaxed,exciting, and rewarding at the same time. In other words there is never a dull moment, in a good and fun way. You get the feeling that everyone is doing their best to help the children when you are at Langsford, as that is the main focus. It is a fun place to be especially around holidays, birthdays, or any other big life events that the kids may have while getting help from the center. They truly treat you like family. So if you’re ready for a rewarding career in helping tutor young and older kids, this is the place for you! You will definitely walk away with more that you came in with.

I really did not have any cons for this place.

You supposedly get an opportunity to help children with learning disabilities. That said, the session I sat in on was concerning. The child/client had significant learning disabilities and other developmental issues that were not being covered in our training. The instructor was worn out -- I assume from working with similar clients all day long -- and unable to keep the child's attention. The session ended when the child randomly stood up and walked out of the room. The tutor looked at me and gave an exasperated shrug. Though I only got to spend 20 or so minutes with the child, I got the impression that she needed help beyond what Langsford had to offer. I asked the tutor if many of the children's situations were as severe, and she said said no. I asked the tutor if she felt the child made progress during that session, and she said it's complicated but yes. I asked if clients worked with the same tutor each time they came in, and the tutor said no it's whatever tutor with a certain training level is available. I am not saying Langsford doesn't help it's clients. I am saying I did not witness a clearly effective session. Despite the chaos of the session and its questionable results, it actually did make me want to stick with the ridiculous training in hopes of being able to help this little girl and others.

This is long, but if you are considering working for this company I recommend reading it ... There are/were 28 hours of classroom training. You were supposed to be paid $175 upon completion of this training. There were about a eight hires in my class. The training was an unorganized waste of time. The first day it was revealed that in addition to the 28 hours of classroom training, there would be a couple hours of take home training every night. Older, more experienced job seekers were able to recognize the sham quicker than myself, and two of the eight did not return the second day. Even more dropped of the next. When I left, there was only one other trainee remaining and he was young, green, recent college grad like myself. We were past 28 hours of in-class training, we had not received $175, and management was unwilling to say how many more hours of training were required (they estimated six more hours). I arranged a meeting with the executive director (who was in charge of hiring), to discuss what how this could be resolved. We were to meet early in the morning, before training started. He did not arrive the day we were to meet, so I sat through another day of training. The next day I showed up again, sat down in their lobby, and said I was waiting until the executive director arrived. Front desk called and let him know. He showed up and hour or two later. During this meeting, I mentioned that I needed to receive in writing the hourly wage I was quoted during the interview process, $13. He said he would need to check with someone or something before doing so. I then brought up that the $175 for training was for 28 hours, and that I'd like to be compensated accordingly for the extra hours. He refused, saying that even though the training is supposed to be 28 hours, the $175 is for up to 34 hours. This had never been mentioned before. To lessen the blow, he told me I would receive 20 hours of work a week after training. I was young and dumb, and was unwilling to just call the 30ish hours I had already invested in training a bust. Because the amount of training left was undetermined, I asked if he could agree to pay $5.15 an hour (175/34) for however many hours of training ended up being required. He agreed. I said I'd follow up with email so we could have this all in writing. He was visibly taken aback when I said this. I sent him the email after the meeting with the discussed terms in writing, and he replied back that he actually could not agree to the terms we discussed. He said I actually could receive as little as four hours a week at two hours a day. His email did not address at all the $5.15/hour for training mentioned in my email. His email said he apologized about quoting $13 during the interview process; they would actually be paying me $12.50 an hour. I have all these specific details years later because I have kept the emails. I replied back he could begin paying me $12.50 hourly tomorrow -- no matter if they had me working or doing more training -- or it just wasn’t a good fit. He agreed it wasn’t a good fit. I never received a dollar of the $175, despite having completed at least 28 hours of training.