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Welcome everyone to the Design Board. I'm your host, Tiffany Raffi, and today I'm joined by Amanda Vierheller, COO and co-founder of Playgarden. Amanda has spent most of her life developing groundbreaking curriculum for the youngest children, dedicating her time to working at Playgarden Prep's Upper East Side Program while also leading the Playgarden Online team. She is an educator and specialist in all things early learning. With a passion for making sure that Playgarden's curriculum is in line with the most up-to-date educational research. She helped to co-found Playgarden in 2007 alongside Carlos and Velasca, and also co-founded Playgarden Online when the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic began. Originally from California, Amanda enjoys spending time with her three wonderful children in the Upper East Side neighborhood. Amanda, I am so excited to have you with me today and to dive into all things Play Garden.
Thank you, Tiffany. It's great to be here and wonderful to talk with you about education in the Upper East Side.
Well, mean, diving right in, inspiration is everything. So I'd love to hear what inspired you to pursue a career in early education and to lead you down this path.
Yes, well, I always love working with kids. And one of my favorite people in the world is my Auntie M. She was an amazing teacher. And I used to stay with her for a couple of weeks each year and help her teach summer school. I was so inspired by the way she connected with each student differently to best relate to them. And I can still remember her saying, every child was smart, you just had to find the key to their intelligence.
And that really was my first mentor into early education. I started my career in physical therapy, supporting very young children with their gross motor development needs. And I loved working along the specialists, such as a speech pathologist and a behavioral therapist and learning new techniques. I then had the opportunity to help develop early childhood curriculum and open children's enrichment franchises across the country. And upon moving to New York, I was really inspired by how early children entered preschool programs, as I kind of already knew how impactful learning could be at that really young age. And I was always passionate about early childhood development, but my focus shifted to helping introduce first educational experiences and partnering with Valeska Vunchermister and Carlos Corona, who are married and had three kids in the Montessori schools. I became so interested in how they helped children not just learn academically, but grow life skills. And then we saw the need for very early education downtown, particularly in the Tribeca neighborhood.
There were plenty of early education opportunities in the Upper East Side and the Upper West Side, but in the early 2000s, downtown was still growing to kind of the family neighborhood it is now. And we opened Playgarden to provide a place for children to start learning as early as six months old through music and language programs and then continue to grow and develop through preschool and pre-K.
Well, in full transparency, I've had lots of exposure to the Playgarden way. All three of my kids have gone through Playgarden and it really is the most magical place. I think what is so special about it is that it really identifies specific gaps in the education system. And I'd love it if you could sort of walk us through how you identify those specific needs or gaps in education because I know Playgarden isn't strictly one philosophy, right? It really does pull from the best of everything to really give children that early learning opportunity that sets them up for success, not just from an academic standpoint, but from a life skill standpoint. So I'd love if you wouldn't mind just sort of walking us through that.
Absolutely. And we've loved having all three of your little ones. We really become a family at each of our locations, especially because the children, like you said, start so early. Many preschool and pre-K programs offer only play-based learning, and while play is an extremely important tool for child development, young children can also learn a great deal of academic information and life skills if delivered kind of in their critical phases of growth. And because 85% of brain growth occurs by age five, Playgarden really tries to capitalize on this crucial window of cognitive and language development. By introducing hands-on experiences and peer interaction at a phase where it's really impactful for the rest of their lives. All schools have expectations for students entering kindergarten, but there aren't enough early learning programs to prepare every student to enter school. So Playgarden tries to offer enrichment programs, Mommy and Me, Drop Off, any type of offering where families feel comfortable starting the learning process young. And in this modern world where so much of our learning turns to screens and technology for convenience, starting little ones with interpersonal connections and teaching social skills and communication in these foundational years is just so critical for their whole child development.
I really love that and I've seen it in practice.
I think it really gives the opportunity to really meet each child really where they are and to help support them and help them reach their potential. So I think that's incredible. You mentioned community a little bit. So I'd love to dive in there a little bit more. But how has community really played a role in the early stages of your entrepreneurial journey? I mean, it is, it's one thing to start a small business and another to start a small business that's focused on education. Especially in a landscape where the majority of schools have been institutions that might have been around for a long time. So to be a new player in that industry can definitely be, think, super challenging. So your success is that much more incredible. So I'd love to hear sort of what helped with the success of Playgarden, but also how is the community involved?
I think we've always believed it takes a village to raise a child and we want to be a player in that village. And I think everyone being on the same page in your child's life is really important for them to feel supported. And so we are lucky enough to start children on their beginning journey of education. And we really love to involve the community, our neighbors, the families, the caregivers, the extended family, and really invite them into the early education experience. So we partner with local businesses. We offer concerts in the park. We do flower plantings. We partner with nonprofits that make a difference for children's lives such as Baby to Baby, Collecting Essentials or City Harvest, offering food to those in need. And I think by leading by example, our teachers can help the parents and the neighborhood really show children what we're talking about when we say growing up healthy.
Giving back to the community, being a leader. And all of the neighborhoods that we've been lucky enough to work in have just embraced us, whether it's the small businesses, whether it's the corporations, whether it's the residential buildings, having us come in and offer classes to their families. It's just been really magical to see how everyone believes in our children and starting them off on the right foot from the beginning.
I absolutely hear that. I think, you know, especially in a small business that's in a community, that community is everything, right, to your growth and success. So it sounds like you have found really meaningful and authentic ways to capitalize on that community, but also to give back to it. So I think that's incredible.
I'd love to chat a little bit more about mentorship. I know you mentioned Auntie M was your very first mentor and there might have been some other opportunities along the way. For those listening, what role has mentorship and collaboration played in your personal professional development, but then also the success of Playgarden as a whole?
Yes, I don't think any of us get there alone and I am very grateful to have several mentors over the course of my career. We had an amazing mentor, Natasha Diggs, who helped us when we were creating the curriculum for Playgarden Prep, bringing in the Montessori element. She had opened Montessori schools across the world and was such an expert that we had her help us set up not only the materials, but begin all of the training so that we could ensure that we were threading that philosophy through our curriculum, ensuring that we were respecting and following the child. You mentioned before, that every child has a different learning style. And we could not believe that more deeply at Playgarden. And tapping into not only the learning style of your child, but the learning style that they need right now in this phase of their development to connect and inspire was something that I learned from Natasha and was lucky enough to see her utilize every day.
And I think learning from mentors has helped me in many practical ways as an entrepreneur, but also has been important in just giving me the confidence to believe in myself. Seeing others succeed and care so much about what they're doing to then help and lead others in being successful is a powerful motivator, I think both as a business owner and as a person.
Mentorship is so important. I always say when people ask me for any advice on building a business or growing in your career, it took me a long time to look for mentors. And of course they showed up along the way, but really recognizing who can be a mentor and asking them point blank if they'd be willing to be a mentor, right? Puts them in a head space of wanting to root for you and support you. And so I couldn't believe more in the need for that.
With that said, I'd love it if you wouldn't mind sharing some of your own advice on what you would, what would you say or what type of advice would you give to aspiring women entrepreneurs because I know, you know, right now we're running this campaign, the Launch:HER campaign and we're trying to really focus on not-for-profits that are, and you've been so gracious to be a judge alongside us, but we're really focused on what it might be to, what we can do to really help encourage women entrepreneurs. and especially those who are doing good and making an impact. So it'd be really great if you wouldn't mind just sharing some advice that you might have for women who are aspiring to be entrepreneurs.
Yes, and thank you so much for launching these awards. It's so important to lift up other women and in such a positive way where everyone gets to learn and grow is really inspiring. So thank you for doing that and for including me. I do think that seeking out other women in your field to learn from and alongside is incredibly empowering.
When you find and align with like minded women who share your passions, they can just provide you with priceless guidance and support through challenging times that only they can know firsthand. And so I think maybe the best advice I could give is to learn to use failure as a secret weapon. I think a lot of entrepreneurs, myself included, might tend to be perfectionists. And you know, we're really working hard to ensure that we do everything to the best of our capabilities, but no one can achieve success without many, many failures along the way. So you have to expect to fail and it's difficult to do, but try not to be discouraged. Rather, always look for that silver lining. Look for the valuable lessons that come from those failures and at times I think it's important to be grateful for what we get and other times to be grateful for what we don't get. Failure is the universe setting you down the right path and I know that from failing so many times and trying so many things and thinking that they were going to be a bigger part of my growth but looking back I clearly see the lessons from each failure and how I was actually pointed in the right direction.
That can be so hard to see while it's happening, right? So that awareness is really helpful.
I don't think I've seen it yet while it's happening, but in looking back I just think, wow, those failures were just pushing me towards the success.
So, I mean, that's really great advice. How can we support each other more? I think just from an entrepreneurial perspective, whether it's women in education or even other industries, how can they better support each other from an entrepreneurial perspective?
In my experience, luckily women in education do a really great job of supporting each other, especially in entrepreneurial pursuits. I think teachers are innately givers and their dedication to their students then carries over to their dedication to their peers and their coworkers. And I think platforms that pool information and offer training and curriculum ideas can be invaluable to women in educational fields and all fields. I think pooling that knowledge and that experience and teaching others new techniques rather than letting them find them on their own, just helps lift each other up and builds communities of support in your specialized field.
Specialization and providing that guidance, right, to one another, I think, is definitely a big one. But I think we forget how transferable these skills are industry by industry. And so just taking advantage of that and sharing our wisdom, I think, is so important.
Absolutely. I feel like in the pandemic, we really learned more and better ways to share information with each other. And I know that some of the seminars that we used to hold for parents and caregivers in person, transferred over to webinars, which are so much more helpful. People can listen to them on their own time. They can start and stop, they can make notes and go back. And so I truly feel in education as well as other fields, we can be helping each other on our timelines more easily, and they can be utilizing those tools on their timelines more easily. And those communities can grow even larger when they're not in location places but online communities. Just again helping to propel each other forward.
So now just back to the early education conversation, because it's my favorite. What changes do you hope to see in early education that would better support the community as the whole? I think something I really struggle with is, I oftentimes see articles or studies about best practices, right, and the latest cutting edge research, but I feel like what's really missing is the application of that research to different environments, right? What works in Sweden doesn't necessarily work on the Upper East Side of Manhattan versus the Midwest versus LA versus Miami, right? And I really, I think that's really a big question mark for me.
I'd love to have you sort of chat through what changes you'd like to see in early education. And is it one size fits all or is my perspective at all valid that there might be some nuances from place to place?
100%, your perspective is more than valid. Not only does it skew from place to place, it skews in your own family from where you are; whether it's the child's age, whether you're traveling, whether you're at home, which school your child is attending. There is no one size fits all early education, nor one size fits all way to inspire your child to learn.
You and I both have three children and we know that it is not even possible to have siblings learn in the same way and get the best results. So I think that we need to open our mind to the fact that any early education is good quality education. As I said before, 85 % of brain growth occurs by age five. So up until that time, any early learning your child is exposed to in any format is really building those foundational blocks that they'll use for all of their future academic and life success. Why Playgarden was so passionate about combining educational ethos is so that we can try to prepare children for their next step, whatever that might be. My biggest mission and passion is to provide greater access for quality early education. You mentioned Sweden, and actually in Sweden, 86 % of children one through five years old have some form of free early education. In our country, that's 34%. And so even if your child doesn't start proper school until six or seven, which is very common across the world, their access to early learning opportunities shapes how ready they will be to enter school and be successful.
I have one last question for you. Looking back, how has your illustration or perception of success changed or evolved? I think, I've noticed mine continues to change, right? As I become more tired. But I do think it's really helpful for those, either whether they're starting out or they're fueling their business or they're thinking of starting one or whatever it might be. What are the different markers of success and how has that changed for you over time?
Hmm, I think it has definitely changed a lot. You know, in my early career, I was opening franchises and I think that while I learned so much from the different locations and I loved every part of that journey, it was much more of a goal oriented success. And I feel that I have evolved really to kind of what we were just discussing, acquiring and sharing knowledge. I have personally always loved research and innovative learning techniques. It's a passion of mine and especially as it pertains to very early childhood development. But with the new challenges of our modern world, children deal with so much more stress and anxiety than ever before. They also, due to the pandemic, are overcoming the challenges of delayed language development and communication skills. And so helping families to support these children in coping with daily life, developing self-confidence, and loving and respecting themselves and others is a new challenge we have. And social-emotional learning really is, but can even more be, interwoven through all of education. And so now I feel like sharing the knowledge and experience that we have gained in creating Playgarden and partnering with specialists, with other schools, with libraries, with community centers, has been our focus for the past four years. And it's just been so rewarding working with not only the teachers and educators who are so passionate about helping children, but with the families themselves in being able to offer that consistently at home, and feeling really confident that they're helping their kids grow.
Amanda, that is so helpful and I've enjoyed so much chatting with you and having you share more about your entrepreneurial journey. And I don't know if you're willing to share, but we'd love to hear about what's next, what's to come. What are your hopes for the continued evolution of Playgarden?
Absolutely. So as I said, we are now partnering with libraries and hospitals to offer our Playgarden online program, which is a platform that allows our teachers to connect with little ones without access to early education. And we realized that it shouldn't be a luxury. It shouldn't be a private school experience only. And the hospitals and libraries are helping to absorb those costs and provide tablets for little ones to connect with peers and teachers and really help prepare them to enter kindergarten with confidence.
That's so exciting. I know there's so much to come and I know you'll always be finding new and innovative ways to create impact. So thank you as always and we'll be following along.
Well, same to you. Thank you for being so supportive and thank you for being such an inspirational leader. I am really grateful for your friendship and your support. Thank you.
Of course, likewise. If you're looking to learn more about Playgarden, feel free to head to their website, PlayGardenPrep.com. You can also find Playgarden Prep on Instagram. Thank you again.
Thanks, Tiffany.
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