employer cover photo
employer logo
employer logo

Foundation for Individual Rights in Education

Is this your company?

Think Hard Before Working Here - Anonymous employee Foundation for Individual Rights in Education Employee Review

3.0
16 Aug 2018
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The pay and benefits are better then even most private industry jobs. Time off is rather generous especially for newer employees and there is some flexibility to occasionally work from home. Room to grow as the non-profit seems to be doing well financially and is usually hiring or looking to promote internally year round. For a small company, its technology is up to date. If I ever had a request for something that was IT related and could make a reasonable case for it, management usually approved it quickly. The mission is interesting. Cases and daily news involving higher education produce some great discussion and conversation.

Cons

There are many people that work here who demand their individual personalities be "massaged" on a daily basis. Those who complain the most tend to get paid attention to the most and placated. Senior management mostly work remotely or from home. Unless you are one of them, don't expect much face time with anyone above your pay grade. It is strange to be in a big office where no one really seems to be in charge. And even those more senior staff that show up to the office work behind closed doors most of the day. This company is obsessed with email. If you don't like the fact you will have to write down 95% of what you do and send it via email then don't work here. Meetings are unproductive and usually cancelled last minute. If you get someone on the phone most likely they will keep the conversation as short as possible because, yes you guessed it, they have to answer email. At least it used to be like this, but expect to work most evenings and a lot on the weekend. It won't be actual office work but trying to catch up on other work that you could have been doing if it were not for the constant barrage of emails. There was rarely an evening or weekend where I did not have to do some kind of work just to stay on top of my to-do list. Management has no idea how to handle priorities and time. This can get frustrating when work you need approved or passed along is back benched for the newest, ever changing priority. Managers will cancel your scheduled meetings if it simply inconveniences what they want to work on at any given time. Very little transparency. Upper management will make decisions without consulting more junior staff or at least seeking their opinion. Then those decisions are usually announced via an email with little to no expectation on why it was made. This can get frustrating especially when someone leaves then another staffer finds out their job has substantially changed without consideration for their professional desires and/or current workload. One last thing is that minor mistakes in work, even when it doesn't matter, are usually harshly punished and treated like the "end of the world" as far as seriousness. It won't get your fired but it will get you yelled at by your boss and could be held against you for any future raises and/or promotions.

Explore other reviews about Foundation for Individual Rights in Education

5.0
5 May 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Extremely consistent commitment to the mission. It's easy to truly care about your work and impact. Great opportunities for learning new things. Fantastic people to work with. Every perspective is given thought and recognition.

Cons

Full-time remote work is generally not allowed.

5.0
4 Mar 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

I greatly enjoyed my time at FIRE! The undergraduate internship tends to do a good job of exposing people to all of the different areas in which you can work (whether that's in nonprofit management or on the legal side.)

Cons

I think that the program might be stronger if interns could do more substantive legal work.

See reviews by: Helpful|Rating|Date|All