I’ve had 4 children attend The Grove Academy Dapto 1 since it opened in 2022, and I couldn’t be happier. The educators are caring and attentive, with great daily updates and photos on the portal. They also run wonderful events for families, and I know my kids are always happy and well looked after. Highly recommend!

Great educators, great director. My kids love it and have the best time there! They've learnt so much and made such good friends. Staff are always friendly and keep you updated.

Shout out to all the staff in the Adventurers and Voyagers rooms for looking after our son so well. Great shout out to the team for assisting with his toilet training and transitional plays in the Voyagers room. He is thriving and loves all his educators and the activities that are set up each day. Special mention also to Sierra as the morning drop offs have become much easier with her positive energy.

My children have had the most wonderful experience with The Grove academy. We have attended Mount Annan, Wollongong and Dapto across the last 5 years. Dapto has been so accomodating in supporting some big adjustments in my eldest child's life and emotions that coincide with that. The management staff are responsive to all concerns and take all feedback on board and act on it instantly. I urge people to take reviews with a grain of salt and take a look for yourself with a centre tour.

Despite what I have read amongst the reviews here I must disagree with a common theme amongst the 1 star. I have been lucky enough to have all 3 of my children attend the Dapto 1 campus for the last 2 years. One of our children is certainly more hyper active then some children that attend the centre but we have had nothing but assistance to help set up strong routines and work out ways to assist his transition to into kindergarten this year. I drop my children off everyday with absolute confidence that Paige along with her team of educators will ensure the safety and learning needs of my kids. I have had my children enrolled in other centres before where I ended up pulling them out and cutting back work as I didn’t feel my kids were more than an income to these centres. The Grove Academy goes above and beyond in every aspect in my opinion.

The moment my children started at The Grove Academy Dapto 1, they were happy and were always shown care and were involved in many fun and educational experiences across the day. I have noticed such a change in their learning and development. My daughter was guided in the year before she started kindergarten and was ready to take it head on thanks to the dedicated educators and my son has done so well in learning to communicate and feels safe and supported in his environment and loves going. I would recommend dapto 1 to anyone.

So extremely grateful for their Director and all Educators. They have been so supportive to both myself and my son during some challenging times. They continue to support him during those behaviours and are always so positive, kind and caring towards not only him but all the other children in the room. They have been so supportive and inclusive of myself upon returning to the workforce while exclusively breastfeeding my baby. The educators are always so kind, friendly and handovers upon pick up are always so amazing. Would highly recommend.

My son attended TGA until he started kindy this year My son was diagnosed with ADHD he had a reasonable time till middle of last year when his favourite teacher left Even with his behaviour she new how to deal with him and she did a fantastic job with no major issues Before adhd meds Everything she put in place and suggested fell on death ears when she left Even after he was diagnosed with adhd and medicated the issues kept coming and coming We were getting calls weekly to come in and talk to him Thinking about it know there was one person who had the majority of the issue and 90 percent of the time it wasn’t needed We told management to move her but to no avail as he connected with other workers better I wouldn’t recommend as no one listens from the top down on how best to deal with a non typical child from a parents perspective

Was great when we started at Wollongong. No issues. He clicked with all but one worker who refused to help wipe leaving him to come home with a red bottom. We moved to Dapto 1 she followed to our dismay. We asked for her not to be in his room for the above reason. Which happened thank you. The adventures room went through major upheaval of staff which didn’t help my son’s behaviours. His favourite worker left whom he listened to un -medicated. She did do what we asked. Timeouts and it worked. But apparently the next workers said they can’t do that. We worked out during this time he disliked one worker they just didn’t gel. When she wasn’t in his room he came home happy that she wasn’t there. The previous director didn’t listen to anything we said that’s when we saw her which was extremely rare despite going at different times. to catch her. Lucky she left. We had interim directors before the current one. I tried for months to get funding for an extra person to help and was denied as they already had one. Only to come across a lady who runs the early childhood funding for extra persons to be in the room, told me if 5 kids need it 5 can be accessed. Not too impressed we were denied. My child was having issues and was on a behaviour management plan. I am mortified when we finally got hold of their ABC chart for behaviours. They documented beautifully about the behaviours but not the intervention that should have happened before it went too far. I contacted acqea about this they said I had grounds to make a complaint only it was a short time till he finished was the reason I didn’t lodge one. They agreed they documented beautifully but failed to intervene before it got to incidents. We also worked out he hated the loudness in the room sometimes it was too loud for us. We had a thought 2 kids would get him into trouble they would back off and my son would keep going and be the one in trouble. When these two left and the behaviours stopped!! We asked them to try to limit he exposure to these 2. On the limited times they did this it worked. But all everyone kept asking was could we up his meds!??? No.. they thought more meds were the answer. Which I’m unimpressed with. There is a trainee who is very knowledgeable about neurodivergence but they said but he is only a trainee. But who cares if said worker comes with a set of skills utilise them. He was a god send!! For us and our son. Thank you!!! M We have now gone to kindy. Zero behaviours, very well behaved. The teacher has had no issues in fact we have reduced his medication by half. The pard is happy too. . My thoughts are this what the heck weren’t the daycare doing?? Or were they setting my child up for failure?? He has done a complete 180 from there to kindy. If your child is neurodivergent I probably would look elsewhere. Pretty sure they are screen nowadays. Very placid children in there now.