Uncommon Schools Reviews

Cons

No cons for me in my situation!

Cons

We are growing quickly, so the work load is busy! This isn't really a con, just something for new folks to be aware of :)

Cons

-You have to be willing to do work on your own time. This can be a hard reality, particularly for new educators -Professional development across states sometimes does not account for differences between state standards/ regulations -You have to be willing to continue to learn and adapt as an educator and advocate of young people, holding team members accountable and embracing feedback as a form of care. This can be a hard reality, particularly for new educators -Benefits and pay are adapted to meet the needs of current staff and match similar districts to be competitive. This can mean you have to adjust to changes or advocate for your needs if guidance has changed over time

Cons

- Working here as a minority POC for the area, I experienced a plethora of year long, racist remarks and actions by students. Despite bringing them to the attention of the principal and many other administration members, there was a failure to address these actions in any meaningful way. - The school higher ups did not “teach” staff with care, trust, or any pedagogically sound strategies. Hundreds of threatening conversations stamped with emails replaced educational professional development and or a normal power dynamic between employee and manager. I believe they were able to do this under the guise of “always learning” and having an “all means all” mindset. When I entered the position, I was very excited about the idea of having a support system as a new teacher, but was quickly made to feel that I could only teach using their words, mannerisms, and personalities. - If you choose to work here, I’d recommend considering your main excitements about teaching and hold them up against what RPC offers to staff. They do not support or uphold the joy in teaching or serving children of color. However, if you don’t want to explore making the career your own, trying new things with students, etc. and would rather prioritize moving up the ranks in a company, you might feel satisfied with Uncommon.

Cons

Where to begin. They actually tried to incentivize people to write these for more money so we could start there. I should also probably start when the CEO went live multiple times to try and get teachers at a school dedicated to serve underserved POC to vote for Trump. Maybe the racism? In most settings outside of it, Uncommon is known to create shell-shocked teachers. I was attacked multiple times by students and admin did nothing and was later blamed. I received racist and hateful comments directed towards me by admin and no one did nothing either. I was chastised and bullied by admin on multiple occasions for teaching and pushing for curriculum changes due to racist practices also present. They constantly are not DESE compliant with regards to ESOL nor SPED students and for many schools there was no one who was a native Spanish speaker for the many Dominican and Puerto Rican families they serve. The system is punitive and students are traumatized early to stay in line. Teachers are denied comfortable footwear while being forced to stand the entire day. They will chastise you for language use and overwhelm you to feedback until you become traumatized by e-mails and other bullying tactics to maintain 'culture' while at the same time lowballing all POC staff with lower salaries than their white peers. Do not work here if you want a positive experience or wish to enjoy teaching.

Cons

Get ready to do an insane amount of work, there is zero work-life balance. My first two weeks I was working 12 hours a day and consistently felt behind no matter how much work I put in. As I learned to manage my time and knew what I had to do and got more familiar the work hours decreased and I could leave on time but there were a few times I worked like 14 hour days to catch up or learn something new. The stress of the job is a lot and I can see how burnout is super prevalent. Expect phone calls from parents and kids after school hours as well if their child ever gets in trouble or they want to know something in particular. There were multiple times where I would be out eating dinner or about to fall asleep and I had received phone calls and either had to step out of the restaurant or pick-up as my eyes are closing because I was scared that parents would complain they could not get ahold of me. Expect to also take work home in addition to working at school. Leadership will kind of blame you if kids are off-task, not directly but they kind of make you feel guilty if a student is misbehaving and chalk it up to the fact that your teaching was not engaging enough. Most of the staff is super nice and willing to help you especially if you are a first-year teacher but there are definitely still cliques and an underlying toxicity. Some teachers might make you feel stupid for asking questions or being unsure about something which will then make you afraid to ask in general. They prioritize feedback insanely -- you can be teaching or in the middle of a lesson and they will give you real time feedback which I personally found helpful but some teachers may find annoying. The class sizes are also very large in relation to teachers, they have a certain quota of kids that they need per grade (I forget exactly what it is) so each class is like over 30 kids.

Cons

Insane hours. Condescending supervisors. Work does not stop on weekends.

Cons

The hours are fairly long with extensive prep time sometimes required in order to have lessons fully prepared for the next day of work. There is very little prep time or break time and your prep may be at odd hours, which may make it difficult to eat. You're on your feet most of the day and there are frequent afterschool meetings, which sometimes run till 5pm and are not always necessary.

Cons

There is high staff turnover so every year is like starting brand new.

Cons

Just look up typical NYC Charter Schools. It's all accurate.