--- title: "How Sylvan Learning Supports Its Franchisees" url: https://burnaze.com/article/bdda8cfd-898b-49eb-8295-36316e7c532e source: "1851 Franchise" original_url: https://1851franchise.com/how-sylvan-learning-supports-its-franchisees-2718535 category: "Tutoring" industry: "Education & Childcare" segment: "Tutoring" published: 2022-04-27T18:13:00.000Z modified: 2026-11-01T02:12:05.494Z image: https://newimage.1851franchise.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=85,format=webp,width=1280,height=720/story/featureImage/b2f1bb967fef14686fa05af139ea4e073286.jpg --- # How Sylvan Learning Supports Its Franchisees **TL;DR:** Sylvan Learning, a provider of personalized education for K-12 students, supports its franchisees through various means, including training programs, marketing materials, and dedicated franchise business consultants. The company has been transforming how students learn for over 40 years and has more than 710 points of presence worldwide. *originally published in 1851 Franchise on 2022-04-27. [Read the original](https://1851franchise.com/how-sylvan-learning-supports-its-franchisees-2718535).* ## Key facts - Sylvan Learning has over 710 points of presence worldwide - Sylvan provides a 101 training program for new franchisees - Franchisees are paired with a dedicated Franchise Business Consultant ## Story Sylvan Learning, the leading provider of personalized education for K–12 students, has been transforming how students learn for more than 40 years. With more than 710 points of presence worldwide, Sylvan is a proven leader in the education industry, drawing franchise owners from a variety of experience levels and backgrounds. “We’ve got everything from experienced business owners who are attracted to Sylvan because they get to help kids, to lifelong teachers who have always dreamed of running their own businesses,” said Leslie Poteet, Sylvan’s senior director of franchise services. “My team and I tailor our support for these folks to amplify their different strengths and fill the gaps where necessary so they can run a successful center and fulfill the vision that brought them to Sylvan.” Everything Sylvan does is geared toward helping students learn. That starts with helping franchisees succeed. That’s why Sylvan puts a premium on providing world-class support to franchisees before and during the launch of their business, along with ongoing support as their centers thrive and grow. ## Franchisee support system Whether you’re a career educator, a business owner with no educational background or a corporate employee launching your own center, the launch process starts with going through the Sylvan 101 training program. Sylvan 101 is an onboarding boot camp. IT covers curriculum planning, operations and marketing, all while helping franchisees quickly become proficient in the brand’s proprietary systems. From there, franchisees are paired with a dedicated franchise business consultant, who helps build out an individualized, actionable business plan and creates a checklist to guide franchisees through the launch process and beyond. To help franchisees establish and grow their centers, Sylvan provides a wealth of marketing materials. The brand offers a digital hub filled with customizable marketing assets, graphics for social media and scripts for outreach to local influencers like PTA presidents and small businesses geared toward parents. “I think our marketing department is amazing,” said Judy Cornell, former director of parent and school partnerships, who is now a center owner herself. “We have so many materials at our disposal that we can fully customize or just put our center name and phone number and go. However you want to go about it, these are proven, effective marketing tools to help grow your business.” When a franchisee is paired with a Franchise Business Consultant (FBC) during the training process, it’s not just for the launch. It’s forever. The consultant may change over time — and it often does as franchisees scale their businesses and require different levels of support — but a Sylvan franchisee always has a dedicated FBC at their disposal. “The FBC is a franchisee’s connector to everything,” said Poteet. “Whether it’s a subject-matter expert in our education department, a technology need, help coaching their team or developing high performers on their staff, the FBC either has the answer the center owner needs, or they know who does and they can connect them to that person.” FBCs are not just on call for franchisees when they need them. They are in constant contact to make sure the franchisee has everything they need to run their business effectively. “I have weekly meetings with my consultant,” said Leah LaClaire, a center owner in Essex, Vermont. “I can reach out whenever I need them, but I really look forward to those weekly meetings because it's a time for me to slow down and reflect on how I’m doing as a business owner. That’s really important to me.” ## Education team support One of the primary goals of Sylvan’s education team is to continuously review and evolve Sylvan’s curriculum so they can provide the best learning experience possible, even in a rapidly evolving industry. The team also aids in technology implementation, the evaluation of individual students who may be struggling and providing franchisees with support and solutions, even in the most unique circumstances. “Our education team is wonderful,” said LaClaire, recalling the support she received at the onset of the pandemic in 2020. She says that when center owners learned that they would not be allowed to provide in-person instruction and were forced to pivot to virtual learning, the education team made the transition as seamless as it could have been. “It was hard knowing that we couldn’t have kids in our centers and we couldn’t make that personal connection,” said LaClaire. “But the education team was quick to help us as franchisees develop plans to still provide support for students in a virtual setting. They’re always up to date on emerging educational practices and what’s going on in the world of academia, so they’re always a tremendous resource.” Sylvan’s vice president of education, Emily Levitt, leads Sylvan’s education team. One of her many responsibilities is to ensure that the team stays up to date and delivers programs that will help students learn the different approaches that are expected in class. Levitt and her team always have their pulse on what’s going on in education and how to work through changing standards to bring the highest-quality educational experience to students. “Some education companies may have one person that they occasionally run things by,” said Levitt. “But it's rare to have a dedicated full-time team like ours. We're here all day, every day, focusing on the children and the quality of instruction. And it's paid off. We've been around 43 years, and there's a reason for that: We're good at what we do and we have the experts to back us up.” ## Franchisee development and feedback Being an education company, Sylvan is always looking to gain knowledge about the franchisee experience so it can better position its franchisees for success. The brand regularly polls center directors and franchisees to guide its trainings and make sure it’s providing guidance that will actually help them run their centers more efficiently and better educate students. It also hosts weekly trainings to highlight successful franchisees in different markets, allowing other center owners to see what strategies are actually working and leading to success. Additionally, Sylvan offers access to professional development tools so its franchisees can continuously learn and grow. Franchisees can earn certifications for nearly every role within a center, including center director, and franchisees take advantage of these certifications as part of the culture of learning Sylvan has created. “I think it’s unique to Sylvan and something that we believe in,” said Poteet. “Because we're a learning organization. If we're dedicated to helping kids develop a love of learning, we should exhibit that same enthusiasm in our own professional development. Sylvan gives us that opportunity. One of the biggest reasons Sylvan is able to provide world-class support to its franchisees is because the brand owns six corporate locations of its own, so it’s intimately familiar with the obstacles franchisees face on a daily basis. Poteet runs Sylvan’s corporate centers and says owning and operating centers itself positions the brand uniquely to relate to its franchisees and support them from a position of understanding. “Having our hand in running Sylvan centers the exact same way that we ask our franchisees to helps us tremendously,” she said. “If franchisees are having a hard time with staffing shortages, we are, too. We feel the changes in the world that affect their business. And I think that puts us in a position to be uniquely qualified to identify issues and make recommendations based on what we actually do in our own centers. Because everything we recommend comes from a place of trust and experience and wanting our center owners to succeed, no matter what they have in front of them.” *Start-up costs for a Sylvan Learning franchise range from $85,525-$186,930. Learn more at* *www.sylvanfranchise.com**.* ## Entities - 1851 Franchise (publication) - Education & Childcare (sector) - franchise support (topic) - Sylvan Learning (company) - education industry (topic) - training programs (topic) - franchisee development (topic) - marketing materials (topic) --- Originally reported by 1851 Franchise (https://1851franchise.com/how-sylvan-learning-supports-its-franchisees-2718535). Summarized by Burnaze (https://burnaze.com/article/bdda8cfd-898b-49eb-8295-36316e7c532e).