Kids & Company

All staff are wonderful with the children. Highly recommend.

My son was at scotia location for two years in the preschool. So ; i can review only the pre school and management.Pros:-Very close to work places.-Have part time and half day daycare options-camera in the rooms-Nice learning environment.-Very safe environment-Food comes from outside licensed company so teachers can focus on kids.-Lovely playground (inspite of being downtown ). love the nature part ( tree) in it.Cons:-Our first 1 year was bad because one of the ECE (who was with Kids co for 7-8 years ) was highly critical of less independent students ( she has left the centre now).My child also complained she was harsh in the washroom area.So, please talk to your kids.Our experience was shared by other parents about her as well . You can read on yelp ( not recommended reviews section ).Having said that ; now some of the staff is caring .-very high turnover brings inconsistency on programs and effects a child emotionally .-Director was very support but it eventually it comes down to your luck as to what kind of teacher is in the room. Some were caring while others were moody . Yes ...moody to the extent of ignoring parents greetings plenty of times. (Also shared by other parents who had kids there).But then to be fair ....i guess all the above points can happen in any daycare.And its really sad because at this stage children have tender minds and giving brusque attitude negatively effects them .I hope for better laws on daycare ;as demand for and fees for day cares is increasing but quality isnt.-This centre was better than other centres of KIds co .The director here was caring.My son was also at st Andrew centre for a month .The regular female staff teacher would yell at kids ( as heard from back door where strollers are parked!.Now surprisingly; she is a director at some other branch.-Lastly; there were no live music classes offered as promised during fee increase.After an year the program gets very repetitive.I will reiterate ;above points can happen in any other daycare. But; my advice for kid co (if anyone is listening and will follow up on it) , is please put less pressure on staff to take pictures rather the focus should be to give attention to kids in the class. All kids aren't the same and slow ones slip through the cracks.They need more attention.Love and care go a long way.Less stressed staff means happy kids.For parents;If safety is your main concern this daycare is great but not so much for learning .Thank you Kids co for taking care of our son who was in half day program.Hope now you find a great director for this location just like last time.

We have had a great experience at Kids and Co Scotia plaza, all the staff have been very nurturing, caring and patient as our son adjusted to the new environment. They have also been flexible if I need to change a day and always very responsive with emails. Our child is always doing new activities and we get daily reports and pictures of what he does.We are very happy with the care that has been provided.

My child attended the Scotia Plaza location from 11 to 28 months old. My poor rating is not a reflection of the actual ECEs and general staff or even of the centre director (who all generally cared for the children and did their best under the sub-par conditions) but rather of the upper level management that created a negative work environment, which ultimately trickled down to my child's level of care.The amount of turnover was very high, with new caregivers coming through every couple of months which caused inconsistent level of care for my child. After speaking with some of the staff who had left, they revealed that they were paid minimum wage (at $2600 for infant care I found this obscene), were made to do lesson plans and other work after hours without pay, and were expected to do laundry and other cleaning duties while watching the kids (impossible as laundry was in a separate room) which meant that the ratios in the room were often not in alignment with the province rules. Also, fees were raised multiple times within a year without seeing any improvements. I would expect that if fees are raised, that we should either see a raise in the pay for employees to show them that they are valued, or to improve the supplies in the classroom which were very scarce or of low quality (very damaged and old toys and books, for example). We have since moved to a new centre (non-profit) and there one of the main focuses is on treating staff very well (that includes compensation and break time). If they valued their staff, it would trickle down to the children.I should also mention that well before we decided to leave the centre, I tried sharing these concerns with the CEO, Victoria Sopik hoping to get some explanation and plan to address the high turnover, but my multiple emails went unanswered.My child has since really flourished in her new centre and I've really noticed the difference. I think this company takes advantage of the fact that parents are desperate daycare spots, and charges crazy high fees for less than average care. There is way better out there so keep your standards high!Edited this review to add the following:I did contact the Director of Enrollment as per the reply I received to this review. Nothing came of it other than they would share the info with HR. No explanation as to why the CEO Victoria never responded to any of my attempts to share my concerns with her while my child was still enrolled there. Please keep this in mind when reading my full review above.