Sunny Bear Academy, Jamaica Plain | Fees, Rankings, Address, Admission, Vacancies, Reviews & More

I have been meaning to write this review for the last 3 months but with an infant there just never seems to be enough time. There weren’t many reviews online of Sunny Bear Academy when my husband and I decided to enroll our son. I’m posting this because I wish there had been so I could have had some insight into how poorly it is managed.

We had decided on Sunny Bear because it was a convenient location and a reasonable price. We were not impressed by the surrounding area but inside the daycare it looked very homey. We met an acquaintance who said it was nice but there was some difficulty communicating with the staff. We also saw on our neighborhood website there was a family that loved it. We did not know anyone personally who had sent their children there but wished we had so we could have gotten more information.

We toured the daycare when we were pregnant, filled out the paperwork, and paid an application processing fee. Months later we filled out more paperwork and paid a deposit. There were multiple locations in the forms where you noted your child’s birthdate. We had planned to send our son there when he was 9-10 weeks old and had even discussed with the daycare which day we would start. Three business days before our start date (and my return to work date) we called the daycare to ask what items to bring. The manager of the daycare mentioned that we could bring baby food. We were surprised by that and responded that our son was only 2 months old and therefore didn’t eat baby food. The manager of the daycare responded by asking how old our son was, something she should have known, and when we said 9 weeks she replied that they didn’t take infants less than 3 months. This was shocking as we had been communicating with the daycare for months, we had been very clear about our due date, birthdate, and when our son would start. She then back-tracked and asked if our son was “a big 2 month-old.” We were very taken aback by this question. It made it seem like she was going to try and pass our son off as older than he was and it made us question whether that could be a legal issue with their license.

I asked to speak with the owner of the daycare. She called me the following day and said that they often “make exceptions” and take kids under 3 months. She also said that “a 2 month-old is basically the same as a 3 month-old.” Both of those comments made us feel very uneasy. I am a pediatrician and developmentally there are differences between 2 and 3 month old infants. We told her we were not interested in enrolling our son and would like our deposit back. She agreed to send the deposit but not the application fee.

Based on our experience, I would NOT recommend Sunny Bear Academy. Perhaps other families had better experiences but our experience was concerning.

6 years ago my daughter went to this terrible daycare she was only 3 month old one day I went to pick her up after work and notice my daughter has been crying uncomfortable when I check her hands her finger was blue and purple ended up at the hospital in which doctor agreed with me that it looks like something felt on her hand or someone hit her hand nobody at the daycare knew what happened, my poor baby ended up loosing her nail thankfully it grew back after time. Wouldn’t recommend this daycare to nobody. And yes I file a report right away.