Great Minds’ Richmond headquarters is at 840 Hermitage Road in Sauer Center. (BizSense file photo)
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to include information shared from Great Minds since it first published.
Great Minds, the education curriculum developer that moved its headquarters to Richmond three years ago, is laying off dozens of employees.
The company, based at 840 Hermitage Road in the Whole Foods-anchored Sauer Center development, will cut 79 workers by year’s end, according to a notice it filed with the Virginia Employment Commission.
The employees were given notice of the layoffs on Nov. 1, the letter states. Their last day of employment will be Dec. 31.
The letter offered little detail as to the reasoning behind the cuts.
“This decision is necessitated by changes to Great Minds’ operational model and a desire to reorganize and/or eliminate certain roles,” it states.
The company said in the VEC letter that all the affected employees work remotely and are in 31 different states and report to supervisors across the country.
Of the 79 layoffs, two involve Virginia employees, the company said.
Great Minds has 1,450 employees, including 46 assigned to its Richmond office.
Great Minds founder Lynne Munson
The letter to the VEC states that Great Minds maintains offices in Richmond, Washington, D.C. and Farmington Hills, Michigan, but the “vast majority” of its employees work remotely.
The letter, dated Nov. 3, was signed by Rodney Whitmore, Great Minds’ head of human resources. A message left for Whitmore Tuesday afternoon was not returned.
The letter refers correspondence to Great Minds General Counsel Donna Brown, who could not comment when reached earlier this week and could not be reached Tuesday.
An email to founder and CEO Lynne Munson was not returned by press time.
The company said the layoffs are permanent and the impacted employees are not represented by a union.
Munson founded the company in 2007, offering its own curricula for English, math, science and history that’s used by public, private and charter schools, as well as homeschoolers. It works with teachers and scholars to develop programming for pre-kindergarten through grade 12.
Munson relocated the company’s headquarters to Richmond, leasing all 17,000 square feet in the one-story building near the intersection of Hermitage Road and West Clay Street in 2019. The company said at the time it had room for at least 80 workers in the building.
The office is known for its resident life-size Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton.
Great Minds’ Richmond headquarters is at 840 Hermitage Road in Sauer Center. (BizSense file photo)
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to include information shared from Great Minds since it first published.
Great Minds, the education curriculum developer that moved its headquarters to Richmond three years ago, is laying off dozens of employees.
The company, based at 840 Hermitage Road in the Whole Foods-anchored Sauer Center development, will cut 79 workers by year’s end, according to a notice it filed with the Virginia Employment Commission.
The employees were given notice of the layoffs on Nov. 1, the letter states. Their last day of employment will be Dec. 31.
The letter offered little detail as to the reasoning behind the cuts.
“This decision is necessitated by changes to Great Minds’ operational model and a desire to reorganize and/or eliminate certain roles,” it states.
The company said in the VEC letter that all the affected employees work remotely and are in 31 different states and report to supervisors across the country.
Of the 79 layoffs, two involve Virginia employees, the company said.
Great Minds has 1,450 employees, including 46 assigned to its Richmond office.
Great Minds founder Lynne Munson
The letter to the VEC states that Great Minds maintains offices in Richmond, Washington, D.C. and Farmington Hills, Michigan, but the “vast majority” of its employees work remotely.
The letter, dated Nov. 3, was signed by Rodney Whitmore, Great Minds’ head of human resources. A message left for Whitmore Tuesday afternoon was not returned.
The letter refers correspondence to Great Minds General Counsel Donna Brown, who could not comment when reached earlier this week and could not be reached Tuesday.
An email to founder and CEO Lynne Munson was not returned by press time.
The company said the layoffs are permanent and the impacted employees are not represented by a union.
Munson founded the company in 2007, offering its own curricula for English, math, science and history that’s used by public, private and charter schools, as well as homeschoolers. It works with teachers and scholars to develop programming for pre-kindergarten through grade 12.
Munson relocated the company’s headquarters to Richmond, leasing all 17,000 square feet in the one-story building near the intersection of Hermitage Road and West Clay Street in 2019. The company said at the time it had room for at least 80 workers in the building.
The office is known for its resident life-size Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton.
If you read the comments on Glassdoor by employees (both those saying they are being laid off and others still employed) it sounds like the company is not doing well at all.
Sad – because we need more educational alternatives for children.
Wait—there’s an actual T-Rex skeleton in Richmond? I’m going by to see it. Will they let me in?
It’s a full-scale “scientific reproduction” of an actual T-Rex skeleton:
RVAStanTRex (greatminds.org)