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Scientific Learning

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Scientific Learning Reviews

3.8

72% would recommend to a friend

(43 total reviews)

Robert C. Bowen

100% approve of CEO

29% positive business outlook

Scientific Learning has an employee rating of 3.8 out of 5 stars, based on 43 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Scientific Learning employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Information Technology industry (3.9 stars).

Reviews by job title

43 reviews
1.0
Nov 9, 2018
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Outstanding benefits - the best employee healthcare plan I have ever seen. There is no 401k matching, but the health and dental insurance make up for it. HR uses a great program called Bamboo that is very user-friendly. Travel planning and expenses are also done on a very user-friendly program, Concur. Depending on your position, you are likely provided a laptop and reimbursement for phone and internet. Many employees communicate on Skype Lync which allows calls, video-conference, chat, sharing screens, presentations, etc...but not all employees use it. The company has done a great job in selecting which software programs to use. The programs are so user-friendly that you really do not need any training at all. The support team is very supportive and helpful. The Professional Development Operations Team is very knowledgeable about the product and helpful.

Cons

I was hired to go through a Professional Development Manager Training that was supposed to last 2 to 3 months. I was really confused why they hired me in the first place because from the 2nd day, they avoided me like the plague (never returned phone calls, texts, emails - I couldn't ask questions which is fundamental to learning). In my 47 days of "training", I only got 3 days of in-person training and one 30-minute training phone call from my mentor (who was responsible for my training). *To hide the fact that I was not getting trained, my boss and mentor falsified my training documents to make it look like I got double/triple the amount of training with my mentor than I did *Because my mentor was ignoring my phone calls, texts and, emails (I went an entire month without any significant response and never saw him for a month), my boss said she would switch me to another mentor halfway through, but that never happened. *On the 3 days of training that I did get with my mentor (out of 47 days in the training program), I was told NOT to bring my computer and take notes. I have to take notes to learn, and I use notes as a reference for a later date. This was denied me. After expressing my concern that I can’t learn without notes, I was able to get special permission from my boss that I could take hand-written notes even though she knew my typed notes were of a much higher quality. My boss “politely” and with a smile held a grudge against me for making this request. With a fake kindness in her tone, she spoke to me as if I were a slow learner because I wanted to be able to take notes. ENTIRE MONTH GOES BY AND NO TRAINING FROM MY MENTOR: My mentor avoids my texts, emails, and phone calls. My boss responds with false empathy and a smile harbors a grudge against me for telling her. She “kindly” comes up with excuses of somehow it was my fault that my mentor can’t talk to me - a way for her to vent her resentment. As long as I make her aware of the issues, she can’t easily pretend that she doesn’t know about them. My boss doesn't want any more work, so if I made her aware of an issue, instead of solving the problem, she resented me for telling her. Hiding her resentment under fake compassion, my boss tells me to deliver parts of a training that I had never seen from my mentor before; I had never observed my mentor deliver the training, yet I had to present it. I made my boss aware that I HAVE NEVER OBSERVED my mentor give a training and thought I should observe him first. She “compassionately” told me it didn’t matter that I never got training (huge lie). She told me that I was going to get a different trainer/mentor half-way through my training process, but that never happened (another huge lie). She just said that to quiet me. I HAD TO GIVE A TRAINING ACCORDING TO MY MENTOR'S STYLE OF WHICH I HAD NEVER SEEN BEFORE. I had delivered a training according to what I had witnessed from another PDM whose style was the polar opposite to my mentor's …so, of course, it did not blend well with his presentation. Again, I denied me any training and did not tell me to know to prepare so that it would fit in with what he was doing.

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Scientific Learning Response
7y
Thank you for taking this time to provide your feedback. We find value in all feedback and are always looking to improve the employee experience. Thanks again for your review and best of luck in your future endeavors.
1.0
Aug 1, 2018

very hostile place to work

Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Wonderful product. Wonderful customers and co-workers.

Cons

Management is beyond unethical, passing into that of bullying, harassment, and forced submission. Mainly, this is because they have no idea what they are doing. They will fire you without notice and won't even do it face-to-face. You simply just won't be able to log in one day and then you'll receive a phone call later that day, whether you've been with the company for 8 months or 8 years, they don't care. There are no checks and balances. HR is in collusion with management so complaints are never resolved and now you have a target on your back. You are micromanaged to the fullest extent of the definition and talked down to as if you are an insubordinate moron. There is certainly a power complex in some of the management, namely in the professional development and education consultant realm. I have seen so many people quit with great hesitation, solely due to poor management. The hesitation comes from the fact that this is a great job if management weren't so awful.

avatar
Scientific Learning Response
7y
Thank you for taking the time to provide a review. We treat all feedback as valuable and we always use feedback to make sure we are creating a great employee experience. Thank you again for your review. It helps us make Scientific Learning a better place and best of luck in your future endeavors.
3.0
Oct 2, 2014
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Nice mission (teaching kids to read with technology). Nice people who are passionate about their work. Some good patents. Lots of smart people who know a lot about the educational software market. Adequate to above-average benefits.

Cons

Product is just not competitive in the marketplace - years and years behind where it should be. The pace of development at Scientific Learning is glacial. Senior leadership doesn't have an adequate plan for growing and becoming a relevant company. As a consequence, salaries aren't particularly competitive with the rest of the bay area. Check the stock price - it's not an accident.

Viewing 1 - 3 of 43 Reviews

Glassdoor has 44 Scientific Learning reviews submitted anonymously by Scientific Learning employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Scientific Learning is right for you.