direct support professional

registered nurse

habilitation specialist

life skills trainer

teacher's aide

ACLD

I worked at ACLD for a period of time and, unfortunately, my experience was overwhelmingly negative. The management style and overall organizational culture left much to be desired. Here are some key observations from my tenure:

1. **Focus on Numbers Over Clients**  
   - There seemed to be a relentless drive to meet certain quotas and targets, rather than genuinely prioritizing the well-being of the clients.  
   - The organization frequently emphasized statistics and numbers, overshadowing the individual care and attention the clients truly needed and deserved.

2. **Lack of Genuine Care**  
   - While ACLD’s stated mission is to support individuals with diverse needs, I found that the day-to-day reality did not align with that mission.  
   - Management decisions often appeared to be profit or metric-driven, which sometimes compromised the quality of services provided.

3. **Poor Employee Treatment**  
   - Many employees, including myself, felt undervalued and unsupported.  
   - Management’s communication was often top-down, dismissive, and lacked transparency. Constructive feedback or new ideas from staff were rarely acknowledged or appreciated.

4. **High Turnover and Low Morale**  
   - As a result of the stressful work environment and lack of support, staff morale was notably low.  
   - The high turnover rate made it difficult to maintain consistency in client care, further impacting service quality.

5. **Unaddressed Concerns**  
   - Several colleagues expressed concerns regarding staffing ratios, resources, and training, but little seemed to change.  
   - Efforts to discuss improvements were frequently met with defensiveness or a lack of follow-through from higher-ups.

Based on my personal experience, ACLD’s management culture prioritizes numbers over genuine client engagement and staff well-being. If you are looking for a supportive work environment or a place genuinely committed to client-focused care, this may not be the best fit. My hope is that ACLD will eventually address these issues and realign with a more compassionate and staff-supportive approach, but during my time there, that was not the case.

On typical day (pre-covid), I’d clock in at program and drive a company car to pick up the individuals from their home. You might drive a wheelchair van with a lift, if you’re not used to driving vehicles of that size it can be nerve wracking, but less so with experience.  I’d bring them back to program, after everyone (about 10-15 individuals and 2-4 staff) in my assigned room came in I’d start toileting those who need help there. Like the van, I got MORE used to changing adult briefs, but never completely. Soon after, I’d leave on a day outing (delivering Meals on Wheels, delivering tins for Island Harvest, visiting parks) with a small group from the room. This is usually the best part of the day, because the guys often enjoy these trips and smaller groups are easier to manage. If a coworker took them instead, I’d try working on an activity or project with the ones who stayed (making decorations, playing board games, tidying the room). Then they had lunch, some folks needed to be hand fed or get extra supervision. Afterwards my coworkers and I would typically log in a website how each individual progressed towards their goals (anything from washing hands to working on emotional challenges) that day. We’d do toileting a second time, then soon after would be dismissal. After I dropped the folks off home, I’d log any problematic behaviors (like stealing food or hitting people) in a binder. 

Run the other way. DON’T WALK. They will present it as a gift as first, but this is an incredibly hard job. You will be working constantly. There are people who have worked here for years without a raise. you will be on call on weekends a lot more than they say (it’s a lie) and get a stipend that equals cents per hour. You will work overtime due to being undermined constantly by house staff and management. You get paid salaried, so no overtime pay for overtime work, and  doesn’t get paid overtime even during COVID 19. Work follows you home because staff will deliberately call you and ignore protocol for everything and understandably so: Staff doesn’t get paid a lot for the amount of work they do so there is low work morale. They will deliberately not do tasks assigned. Since you are not at one location all the time as you will be stretched thin between group homes, management will not follow up and group home will become high risk for a bad site audit by the state. After a site audit you can say bye to your job.  Endless calls while on call for the weekend. You are on call for five days per week and Same goes for during the week, endless calls. Management is unsupportive and will try to get you to do the work of AMAP and DSP. Nurse is always blamed instead of retraining staff to give medications and treatments properly. Documenting in the MARs correctly is always an issue. There is constant politics between nursing department and management department. Nurse is quickly blamed. If you must work here get in, get out, and whenever someone says they don’t know how to do something, offer them to come in and retrain with you on another day, their tune will change as soon as they realize they have to use their time to do it.

Great field to get into if you like being a caregiver or have a overall love to help out people that society would normally look past and judge as abnormal. You will find out that these individuals are full of love and just have been given a bad roll of the dice. However the company has many downfalls and have plenty of room to grow. Upper management can seem at times to go by the books when at times you have to make a choice from the heart. There always seems to be understaffed and this company has a very high turnover rate when it comes to staff hiring and resigning. Some of the upper management also plays favorites when it comes to people that they have become friends with vs workers that want to provide great service for the clients of the corporation. Take away the favoritism and sheer lack of common sense from some of the upper management and this would be a dream job for anyone that loves to make a difference in a person's life that needs someone that is compassionate, caring, and overall a great person.

Working with individuals with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities was very rewarding. The people that I supported on my caseload were wonderful to work with. On a typical day, you might attend a service plan meeting, conduct a home visit, and fill out paperwork.
However, management was not the most knowledgeable with resources so I did not feel very supported when trying to deal with client issues. Additionally, there was a lot of office gossip and management fed into it; this did not make for a very healthy or productive work environment. The culture of the department reflected the drama and gossiping that often went on.
A major con of the job was the driving all over Nassau AND Suffolk counties. When I started, I was told that management would try and set up clients in the same general vicinity. I had clients ranging from Great Neck to Manorville. On top of that, there was no agency vehicle to utilize.
I found the work/life balance to be very manageable. I never found myself trying to get work done during my off hours.

What is the best part of working at the company?
The pay and independence were the best things for me 

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
The upper management power tripping, the lack of structure and the straight of neglect of individuals. The driving great distances across Long Island for half of your shift and the lack of structure. You’ll be doing a 3 man job bc of the lack of support from anybody. 

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
The work environment was very cliquey and inconsistent depending on management and staffing. There was a lack of communication, accountability, and teamwork, which created a stressful atmosphere. Favoritism and workplace harassment were noticeable issues, and employees were not always treated fairly or professionally. While the work itself can be meaningful, the overall culture made it difficult to feel supported or valued long term.

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
Driving, cooking, cleaning and picking up slack after others

ACLD is a place where if the right people do not like you, they will make your life miserable. They will target you, make up false accusations, if you try to report issues, you will be retaliated against. Friends get promoted, when they are not qualified for positions. If they like you, things do not get reported to HR or QM, but if they want to fire you, they will report every little thing. There is no job security, and they will not follow their own procedures of how to handle disciplinary actions, supervision-verbal warning-written warning-final warning then termination. The favoritism is rampant through out the agency. At any time you can find heads of departments posting on their phones to Facebook, gossiping in offices, shopping from Amazon, leaving early, taking 2 plus hour lunches. There is minimal training offered to people in new positions (Administrator level) where they are "too busy" to go into the residences to offer any kind of real training.

Literally. They pay you next to nothing, which is wild considering how stressful and involved this job is. There’s extensive training but it’s mostly useless as most of the training time the trainer is just telling personal stories for hourssss. They force you to get all types of training (that merits higher pay, and they actually tell you you’d get paid more at a different agency with these certs) but still pay minimum wage, even though you’re essentially giving out meds, housekeeping and driving. Managers are terrible, horrible communication. Bad communication aside, my manager is also just a very cold, unfriendly person. They’re always short staffed, and it’s really obvious why they can’t keep employees. Staff is always late, which turns into your problem as you can’t leave until the next person arrives to relieve you (even if it’s an hour from now!) I’ve only been here for a few months, but I’m already looking forward to quitting soon. Be wary of a place that hires right at the interview.  Would not recommend at all, just get literally any other minimum wage job.

I want to start by stating this job can be extremely rewarding but is also very difficult, you are dealing with a lot of behaviors and low functioning students. Safety is the main priority and you need to be on high alert all day. Teachers are not given much training so those who don’t have experience with this population typically don’t last long, you need to be familiar with ABA and behavior plans. Hardest part of the job is being hit, kicked, bit and unfortunately the pay is lower than it should be considering the environment and population. This job drains you quickly and every employee puts their all into it to be paid unfairly low. They are also understaffed which is frustrating if you are left out of ratio it becomes a safety concern. If they could pay the teachers, therapists, and TA’s better I think there would be less turnover and it would be a better environment for all.

NOT worth the money...spare your mental health. I loved my students. However, the administration only cares about themselves and not the safety of the children OR the staff. Administrators are unorganized and have absolutely no idea what is going on within the classrooms.  They make zero effort to step into classrooms or help out when short staffed (which is ALL the time). They are quick to throw teachers under the bus and clearly do not understand the population of students. There is no legitimate curriculum which makes things even more complicated and unorganized. I could go on and on about the chaos that goes on within these walls. I left completely heartbroken and dissatisfied, and I KNOW that I am not the only one who has left this job on these terms. 

Also should add-- no snack or lunch break till 2:00 pm after kids leave. 

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Direct support professional 167 salaries reported	$21.57 per hour
Registered nurse 69 salaries reported	$85,275 per year
Habilitation specialist 82 salaries reported	$21.71 per hour
Life skills trainer 22 salaries reported	$21.32 per hour
Teacher's aide 16 salaries reported	$20.44 per hour

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