Today we’d like to introduce you to Kay Hunley.
Kay, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
Since I was younger, I always wanted to be a teacher. I used to always play school with my younger brother and cousins, I’m talking from teaching them on a dry erase board to giving them work and grading it. My passion grew from teaching to helping children overall when I started working at a K-12 charter school in North Lauderdale. I finally found somewhere where I didn’t mind going to work because it was something I Ioved doing. There, I worked as a teacher’s assistant helping kids who were struggling, assisted coaching cheerleading, and started my step team. After being there two years, unfortunately, I had to leave due to financial reasons for a better paying job in the medical billing field. I was heartbroken when I left and still wanted to work with children in some way, so I started applying for tutoring jobs.
After being hired to work for a tutoring company, a month later I realized I didn’t like how they operated so I quit. I thought to myself, “Why am I trying to work for these people making only $15/hr when I know they charge way more when I can do this myself??!” That same week, I made some business cards to start advertising for Dazzling Minds. The business cards were delivered on January 8th, 2018, and from that day on Dazzling Minds was my baby. I started handing my cards out to people who worked in my job (I was the youngest that worked there, so the opportunity for clientele was wonderful). Every month, I’d set a clientele goal for myself to reach a certain number of clients and would reach it before my due date. By April of 2018, I sought one of my closest friends to start helping me because the clientele started getting to be too much for me to handle myself. By the end of summer, I had about 2-3 more assistants working with me. We would, and still do fully book every month, just by word of mouth. Fast forward to 2019, I now have 5+ assistants that work with me in helping the young Dazzling Minds of South Florida. The Dazzling Minds team has tutored over 60 students in the South Florida community and assisted by raising confidence, helping pass state tests, giving parents hope, and being there every step of the way.
Has it been a smooth road?
Of course not, it hasn’t been a smooth road. When I first started Dazzling Minds, I didn’t expect it to grow as fast & big as it did within the first year. I was working full time, going to school, and running the business. It got and still gets overwhelming sometimes. Having to conduct two to four sessions after a long day of work, make sure my assistants are prepared and have everything they need for their sessions, keeping consistent communication with all my parents, keeping up with administrative tasks such as invoicing/session confirmations/ sending receipts, keeping my students on point, and scheduling approx. 40 sessions a week is a lot.
At first, when everything started picking up rapidly for me, my anxiety would skyrocket and I would always vent to my dad about how I didn’t know if I could continue to do it all because I was so drained. His words “if it was easy, everyone would do it.” stuck with me during one of our conversations once. From then on, I’ve learned to suck it up because I would rather work hard now, so I can see the vision come alive later. On tough days now, I let my passion drive me. I look at my student’s faces and remember that I’m doing it all for a better future generation. This is only the beginning, so I now keep telling myself that my struggles now will be nothing compared to how big they will be as Dazzling Minds grows more and more into what it’s visioned to be.
Tell us more about the business.
Dazzling Minds provides tutoring, mentoring, and babysitting to children of the South Florida community. We specialize in K-8th reading tutoring, but we do all subjects. What sets Dazzling Minds apart is that we try to make tutoring fun for students, and build authentic relationships with all our young Dazzling Minds. We are also very convenient because we drive to tutor the students at their home; parents don’t have to worry about driving long distances for sessions, having to take their child to tutor after a long day of work, or making sure they’re home for tutoring because we build relationships with our parents as well. What also sets apart Dazzling Minds from the rest is the commitment that each tutor on our team has for our kids. Like I mentioned earlier, we take the time to build relationships with our children, so not only do we teach them academically but we teach them about life as well. Our kids look to us for advice, vent to us about things going on, and enjoy our company when we are around. As the founder of Dazzling Minds, I’m proud of the authenticity that Dazzling Minds has kept throughout the months of us growing. I always share my visions, ideas, and goals with my team and they work hard to grow Dazzling Minds to what it’s visioned to be. I’m also proud of the relationships we have with our kids and parents, and of the mark we’ve left in our current and past kids lives that helped them raise their confidence and showed them that anyone can have a Dazzling Mind.
How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
Within the next five to ten years, I see the industry of children services growing tremendously. The tutoring industry will have the biggest growth as the standardized testing that these kids have to take are only getting harder. Pressures that schools put on teachers to make sure students know everything they need to know for the test leaves them with little to no time to help struggling students who may be falling behind. Due to this growing trend, parents are seeking outside help to assist their children one-on-one. Child mentors may be sought more due to the decline in student’s mental health because of anxieties that these tests cause as well.
Contact Info:
- Phone: 954-865-0447
- Email: dazzlingmindstutoring@gmail.com
- Instagram: dazzling.minds
- Facebook: facebook.com/dazzlingminds954
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