elementary school teacher

high school teacher

teacher

school teacher

operations coordinator

Democracy Prep Public Schools

I have worked at multiple Democracy Prep campuses as both an employee for three years and a private contractor for two years before that. 
I have never seen such dysfunction in a school system in my entire life. Schedules change literally last minute. Students are shuffled between classes and in all three years I worked here classes were completely reorganized after the first six weeks of school. School leaders are encouraged to micromanage teachers, even at the expense of their own job performance. The nature of the "feedback" provided often felt condescending and irrelevant. 
While the network boasts about professional development opportunities, in my experience that mostly meant poorly organized lectures from our own school leaders designed at exploring how teachers were failing to uphold systems. In fact, in three years I can only recall two instances in which professional development was led by a third-party and actually felt like an experience that enhanced my teaching skills. All other weekly professional development was in-network and mostly in-school. 
Scholars are passed along without gaining even proficiency in grade-level material; however, the network and school leaders are unwilling to believe that a scholar's failure to grasp grade-level material may be their gaps in previous grade-level knowledge. 
Network actively disregards feedback from teachers and always asks for feedback in a way that will skew responses to what they are looking to hear. 
School leaders have many obligations outside of running the school and are frequently off campus to perform other duties for the network.
Network is only willing to hire substitutes under extreme conditions. Any time a teacher is out, other teachers are expected to cover. 
Yes, there's great parental leave.  I had three coworkers on parental leave at the same time, two of whom were meant to coteach with me. Only one of them was replaced with a long-term sub meaning that I was unassisted during most parts of the day, such as homeroom, when every other room had two adults. In fact, during one such time, four adults including my principal came in to observe my room and found all scholars working quietly while I assisted a scholar with their chromebook. I still received a feedback email with criticism for how I could improve to which I was meant to send a thoughtful response in between preparing my lesson plans.
The compensation criteria changed after my first year, which effectively made it so that I could not get a raise until my seventh year of teaching in the network. 
Absolutely no action was taken when I twice complained that I felt physically unsafe in my classroom even as scholars repeatedly were suspended for fighting in my class. 
One year the network refused to hire enough teachers until the kids enrolled in our school actually showed up on the first day. 
I frequently felt emotionally manipulated by being encouraged to think of my impact on scholars even as the network actively made decisions that had tangible negative effects on students and staff. 
Working here was hazardous to my mental health.

At Democracy Prep it’s difficult to have a work/life balance which is extremely imperative to work here. After the first week of working you already a feel exhausted and overwhelmed. Teacher PD literally starts within the first couple of weeks of August with no breaks and then students return to school within the last week of August.  Every morning you’ve  to be at work by 7:00-7:15am for huddle-staff morning meetings even though your contract states you start work at 7:30. You don’t have the opportunity to leave work until 4:00pm even though the kids are dismissed at 3:30pm. 
There is also a lot of favoritism and the school/network leaders are aware of this type of culture but refuse to do anything about it. For example, they will promote people that aren’t qualified for a specific position just off of the simple fact that the person and them have a great relationship.
They don’t support teachers within the classroom and they do not support students with IEP’s. A lot of the students require a 12:1 setting and they have them in a classroom with 30+ kids and no academic support. ELL (English Language Learners) receive no academic support in the classroom. At the school I worked at the kids did not have any recess and had silent lunches. Plus, scholars bathroom breaks are regulated which is ridiculous.
The turnover rate at Democracy Prep is ridiculous. On average they lose about 8-12 teachers and 3-4 staff members with other titles yearly. They are always hiring!!! 
The only thing they are passionate about is their school funding.
Lastly, the job insurance is terrible! You only have two options-one of the insurance plan cost $200 a month for one person and the other plan costs around $300 for a family. 
I would not recommend anyone to this place. 

Democracy Prep is committed to meeting the challenge of addressing the needs affecting educational opportunity of inner-city youth. The orientation program for teachers new to Democracy Prep is phenomenal, setting any teacher up for a lifetime successful career in teaching. Standards are high, but consistent with room for creativity and personalization. There is emphasis on continual improvement and no time for complacency. The Camden location is actively meeting their goals year to year of educating responsible citizen scholars and preparing them for success in the college of their choice and a life of active citizenship. Civics responsibilities are taught and supported through volunteerism and other school activities. 

The Camden location has a really good group of stable staff with several who have been there 5+ years. Communications are facilitated with use of an internal messaging system – not dependent on email. The administration, school physician and nursing staff work together to address health needs that affect education. The Camden location is located in a building owned by a hospital system and there is a small ER on the 1st floor of the building. 

There is a bit of an adjustment when coming to this culture of excellence. If one is goal driven with a good bit of initiative who enjoys seeing the success of one’s effort, this is the place.

For an Intern, the day is comprised of much more smaller tedious task than a teachers day. Teachers work towards a similar end goal,Us Interns help by providing the foundation work such as making sure the professionals at work have no excuse. From working under Democracy Prep, I have gained the ability to do work "Just because." No matter how many task they pile in front of me, they will all share the same fate: Completion. Management-wise, Democracy Prep is very organized, complete with an human resource team, a Finance Team, A Data Team and even a Alum Team. I look up to my co-workers because they are on similar walks of life, where as they are around my age and looking for work to develop themselves. The hardest part may be the hours because we have to be up earlier than school starts and later than school ends. The most enjoyable part is the "comparison factor." I like to compare the things I do to the games I play, for example the Democracy Prep network is like the USS Normandy from Mass Effect, Of course i'm Commander Shepherd and we all have an aligned path to save the youth of America with Education. The best part no doubt is the end of the day when we rest from running around in constant motion.

If you care about the development of children it's hard to work here. Children are forced to march down hallways and abide by rules that would be difficult for anyone to follow. Many of the educators that are hired do not have educational experience (no experience working with kids or degrees in specific area of expertise). 
Teachers do not have a healthy work to life balance. They are given a total of 5 days (include sick and PTO) which doesn't correlate with the amount of time spent at work. Teachers usually work over 10 hours a day and have nonpaid Saturday hours to complete. If a teacher is absent, other educators have to cover classes. There is no autonomy in classrooms and educators feel disposable. Many people leave throughout the year and the retention rate for teachers are low. 
Managers lead by trying to ensteel fear in others. Majority of the managers have no training in managing adults, which makes it extremely difficult to grow. Manager are unprofessional and do not encourage feedback.

The finance dept has people at the helm who look absolutely miserable. They look like they hate their jobs as well they lack professionalism and respect. Communication is all around poor since one hand doesn't know what the other is doing. Paying bills feels more like accounts receivable than accounts payable since you'll find yourself chasing employees for their supporting documents for outstanding invoices. It's a mess. Even messier when it's handling the finances for nine schools. Two people left before I joined and one left the week I started. That's never a good sign. It seems to be a revolving door in other areas as well from what I've witnessed. The neighborhood is horrible and felt unsafe. The two people who interviewed me barely spoke in two interviews and gave the silent treatment while working there. Simply abusive and dysfunctional. Avoid this place at all cost.

Overall, the biggest issue is turnover and the changes that occur with turnover.  Meaning, things in every area of the school are  changing all the time.  Compensation might be good this year but you can’t bank on the same package next year.  One year you can earn up to 10% increase and the next year everyone will get a standard increase.  Leadership changes so the expectations are always changing.  There is something to be said for being innovative and different from regular public schools.  This includes being open to doing things differently and to change.  But here, change happens too often and this leads to misunderstandings and confusion.  As a result, staff lack direction on how to meet expectations and do their jobs.  Too much time is spent trying to understand and follow all of the new procedures and expectations.  This confusion trickles down to parents and students.  

The best parts about working at Democracy Prep are that I work with mission-driven colleagues who put our scholars first and that there is ever-increasing transparency about the ways that senior management is working to ensure that our schools continuously improve on behalf of our scholars. The hours can feel a bit long. To combat this, my leadership team is clearly thinking about ways to ensure the work load is manageable. This allows us to make sure that we can effectively use the extended hours to provide more opportunities for our scholars. I also really enjoyed the professional development opportunities provided to me when I first joined Democracy Prep. However, after four full years of employment, I feel that the professional development no longer meets my needs for professional growth.

Democracy Prep promotes its rigorous academics and culture of hard work as something positive but it is more of a reflection of poor management, instructions and inconsistent leadership and discipline that puts everyone in a position to work so much harder than they need to. For example; teachers who worked on their lesson plans over the summer had to completely re-write them 2 days in to the school year because they were not aligned to the networks standards even though no standards were provided at the  time. Students disrespect staff and some are suspended, some are not...

This place is discouraging to work as the teachers do not feel valued at all. In a PD one administration made a comment that "lesson plan feedback is not optional" and this is told to a team of experienced teachers with years of classroom expereince

Everyone’s reviews are accurate about this school. Although they offered a great salary, you will be forced to work over 55 hours per week. The administration is very petty and shows extreme favoritism. Management micro manages their employees. The only teachers who stay are the ones who are forced to through Teach for America. I had never been so miserable, overworked, and unhappy at a job in my life. I would not recommend this school even if you are desperate. Class sizes are 37-40 students. The curriculum is not geared towards individualized attention and you must move on even if the students don’t understand. Management will interrupt you while you are teaching. Also the SPED department does nothing and they never came in my classroom to help my students who really needed help. I felt so bad for them and their parents. I could go on forever but this school is not good at all.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Elementary school teacher 15 salaries reported	$103,218 per year
High school teacher 32 salaries reported	$105,825 per year
Teacher 2 salaries reported	$99,285 per year
School teacher 17 salaries reported	$105,239 per year
Operations coordinator 3 salaries reported	$55,667 per year

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