Little Scholars School of Early Learning - Stapylton

This centre use to be amazing however in the last 12 months Little Scholars began to put profit over quality. They lost an amazing centre director and kindy teacher, both who had been there for many years. The new director, Jess, was almost invisible in the 6 months leading up to my son finishing. The quality of care dropped massively, the educators seemed frustrated at the kids every single day and their turnover was big. The final straw for me was when my son was picked up in the afternoon and had a very large bump on his head - nobody knew what had happened, there was no incident report done and we weren’t notified of the incident occurring. The bump was that large that we took him straight to the doctor concerned he may have a concussion. I raised this with Jess and was given the run around multiple times, promised the report and policy would be sent to me, yet days later had to follow it up again and told “we had printer issues”, even though the policy is in a pdf file. Wasn’t really resolved as was told “staff will be spoken too”, that was it. Imagine smacking your head early in the day and not being given any ice or Panadol and no extra monitoring. Plenty of better childcare centres around, I’d steer clear until the owner Jay puts the focus back on care and not lining his wallet

I want to start by saying how grateful I am for the amazing educators my son had at Little Scholars—unfortunately, many have since left. When we first started, I couldn’t fault Little Scholars. The educators were wonderful, and communication was excellent. However, the last 5 months we were there, the quality of care and transparency declined significantly. Updates became inconsistent, sometimes nonexistent—we once went two weeks without a single daily update. What concerned me most was the lack of transparency about health risks. Cases of whooping cough, RSV, and hand, foot, and mouth disease were present in the nursery, yet parents weren’t informed. Educators were even told not to notify parents. The same happened with staffing changes—educators left or moved rooms without notice, and staff were instructed not to say anything. Staff morale seemed at an all-time low. Educators were burnt out and undervalued. I was especially concerned that untrained staff were counted in ratio from day one, which educators themselves confirmed. This had real consequences—my son once came home with dried feces on his back after a change by a new educator. Another time, he had a grab mark on his arm. When I raised this with the director, she reassured me that all educators would redo safe handling training. That never happened. Despite staffing shortages, the centre continued pushing for more bookings, offering coffee vouchers for booking extra casual days. While a great business strategy, it only works if there are enough staff to provide proper care. Instead, at times, the centre was out of ratio, impacting children’s care. Little Scholars promotes community involvement—giving hampers to businesses, flowers to strangers, and lunch to tradies. While nice, it’s frustrating to see money spent on promotions instead of staff training, appreciation, or resources. The centre itself is beautiful, and some educators made a real difference in my child’s life. But the red flags became too great for me to feel confident leaving my son there any longer. One final note: many five-star reviews were written by staff and others were made during giveaways where parents were asked to leave a review in exchange for a prize entry. That alone speaks volumes.