In June 2025, Higher Ground Education, Inc. and 33 affiliated entities filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Northern District of Texas. By the time the petition was filed, the company that had positioned itself as the future of accessible Montessori had shrunk from roughly 150 schools at the end of 2024 to only seven still operating under its corporate umbrella.
A cramdown liquidating plan was confirmed in November 2025, offering general unsecured creditors recoveries between 1.8 and 10.1 percent.
The Numbers
Court filings and reporting from bankruptcy press tell a consistent story:
- $335 million raised since 2020.
- No positive cash flow in any year of that funding cycle.
- $440 million in operating losses over the past five years.
- $144 million in funded debt at the petition date.
- ~143 schools lost to lender foreclosures in the lead-up to the filing.
ProPublica has not yet published on this collapse, but the financial picture is documented in bankruptcy filings and trade reporting from outlets including Bloomberg Law and Chapter 11 Cases.
The Spin-Off
Before the bankruptcy filing, in spring 2025, approximately 83 schools were transferred out of Higher Ground Education into a separate, newly formed entity called Guidepost Global Education (GGE). GGE's schools and assets were not part of the Chapter 11 estate. According to GGE, approximately 8,000 of the 10,000 children enrolled across the broader network continued their Montessori education without interruption (Guidepost Montessori statement).
The Department of Justice's U.S. Trustee raised concerns during the bankruptcy proceedings about the structure of the debtor-in-possession financing and related-party arrangements (Bloomberg Law). Whether the pre-filing transfers leave the estate adequately resourced for general unsecured creditors is a question that will be litigated in the bankruptcy court for some time.
What This Means for the Montessori Field
Higher Ground was not just another network. It was the largest venture-backed bet on consolidated, for-profit Montessori expansion — a model promoted as the answer to Montessori's access and scale problem. Its collapse calls that thesis into question in ways the field cannot afford to ignore.
For families whose children attended affected schools, this is, first and most importantly, a story of disruption — sudden closures, lost deposits, scrambled enrollment in the middle of school years.
For educators, it is also a labor story. When a national operator collapses, the people most exposed are the guides, assistants, and administrators whose jobs vanish without warning and whose pay and benefits are vulnerable in bankruptcy proceedings.
For the broader Montessori community, it is a structural question:
- How did one organization raise more than a third of a billion dollars without ever achieving positive cash flow, while smaller independent and justice-centered Montessori schools were told they could not be supported because their numbers did not "scale"?
- What does it mean that capital flowed so freely toward a centralized, premium-priced model — and so sparingly toward community-rooted, public, and tuition-accessible Montessori?
- Who pays the price when the venture model collapses? Almost always: the children, the families, and the workforce.
The Peace Rebellion was founded in part because the Montessori field needs serious infrastructure for justice-centered, accessible, and sustainable practice. The Higher Ground collapse is not a vindication of that work — it is a warning about what happens when growth, marketing, and investor returns are mistaken for the work itself.
What We Are Watching Next
- How the bankruptcy court resolves outstanding objections to the plan
- Whether state attorneys general open investigations into the pre-filing asset transfers
- What happens to the workforce — wages owed, retirement contributions, severance, and continuity of care
- How families and educators displaced by school closures are supported in the months ahead
If you or someone you know has been affected by a school closure tied to this filing — as a parent, a former staff member, or a community member — reach out at info@thepeacerebellion.org. We are gathering stories and looking for ways to support the people the collapse left behind.