lifeguard

landscape technician

food & beverage supervisor

performer

guest service agent

Canadas Wonderland

Very fun summer job experience, coworkers were mostly high school and university students, which made building connections and friendships easier as we had similar life experiences. The job itself is straightforward, you work as a lifeguard in an assigned crew (based on your certification) in an assigned location in Splashworks. You and your crew rotate between different attractions, roughly every thirty minutes, and switch between sitting, standing, roving, and slide dispatch positions. If you enjoy lifeguarding and water, want to get into any health or medical fields, and want to spend your summer outside in the sun and at an amusement park (where you get free admission and several free tickets for friends and family) then this is a good opportunity. Private pools would probably have better pay, but it is above minimum here with some additional benefits. 

The summer I worked here, it was incredibly understaffed and rotations would sometimes take multiple hours (resulting in staff standing or roving in the direct sunlight during heatwaves for hours), which management blamed us instead of working on the issue. One lifeguard even passed out from heat exhaustion and required medical attention. The understaffing issue also resulted in extending people's hours and scheduling 6-day work weeks for the full-time staff. They also tried to guilt you into coming in on your days off (even your designated holiday or family days). I once called in sick as I was in the emergency room (and had been all night) and they told me that I was going to ruin everyone else's shift and cause so much additional work, and asked if I could come in after seeing the doctor. Staffing issues are NOT and employees' fault or concern, and nobody (especially young teens) should be made to feel guilty for taking time off (we were given 10 holiday days, 2 sick days, and 2 family days - and you also should not come in to lifeguard on your feet all day in the heat after being in the emergency room and severely sick all night, that should definitely be considered dangerous! 

Further, management spoke to lifeguard staff condescendingly and rudely, and expected staff to know how to complete complex tasks without ever training us. They also took out their frustrations on the lifeguards, often yelling at them in front of guests and other staff, writing them up for minimal mistakes, would force staff to do tasks they were not comfortable with (threaten to write them up), and tried to encourage us to urinate in the pools to avoid taking bathroom breaks. I understand that the safety of the guests and the operation of attractions is a serious matter, and the lifeguards do need to follow guidelines and expectations, however, the treatment by management was incredibly unprofessional and no one, especially young high school students working their first job, should ever be spoken to so disrespectfully or encouraged to not take bathroom breaks. I also had an area supervisor take my watch off of my arm and give it to another supervisor who had forgotten theirs, and a team lead who took and used my reusable waterbottle (resulting in it getting lost) - I was young and inexperienced at the time, so I did not say anything- but this should not happen, supervisors are not entitled to your personal belongings.

I know this might come off as a negative review, but I am hoping things have changed since my employment and that employees, especially young high school students with no prior experience, are being treated professionally and fairly. Other than dealing with management, it was a great experience. Working in an amusement park is interesting and fun, and you get to meet a lot of different people with different perspectives and experiences. I learned a lot and made some great friends and connections. I chose not to return because of the way people were treated, but if that has improved, then I recommend it as a fun summer job. 


I worked at Canada's Wonderland for two years. I started out as a production member (cook) and was promoted to Team Lead (junior supervisor role). 

Overall Review:
In my first year, I worked long hours, exclusively closing (4-12) and there was little negotiation about the scheduling. My supervisor cited "not having enough closing staff" as an excuse despite having 12 members on production. It is my understanding now after being in a Team Lead position that shifts are supposed to be rotated regularly.

As a Team Lead, I worked long, rotating hours. I shared my hours with the assistant supervisors and supervisors. As a result, I would either work 44 hours a week, or 20 hours a week. My hours were much more inconsistent and unpredictable in comparison to being a line-staff. 

In addition to the poor inconsistent hours, I was often unable to take legitimate breaks. Canada's Wonderland uses a phone-in attendance system which is extremely easy to manipulate. Leads and supervisors would often phone in at our 5 hour mark, sign the payroll roster claiming that we took a 30 minute break but would actually work right through it. This was referred to as "fake breaking" and was silently encouraged by members of upper management. I have worked several 13 hour shifts (9AM - 10PM, 12PM - 1AM usually) on one 30 minute break that was "taken throughout the day" (sitting for 5 minutes during a lull, going to the washroom for 3 minutes, ect.) despite claiming to take 3 unpaid breaks.  

Pros: Networking and Opportunities for Advancement.
I was fortunate enough to work in a unit with lots of university students and graduates who helped me find on-campus resources after finishing employment. I also regularly keep in contact with former members of the supervisory team/management. 

From my own experience, it was easy advancing in the company to my position as Team Lead. There are also several managers in the department who have worked their way up to upper management positions from line staff positions (ie cashiers and cooks).

Cons: Unsafe and unsanitary. 
A lot of the equipment in the Food and Beverage department are old and outdated. Some of them are over 20 years old (I checked the model and serial numbers). In addition to this, they break down fairly easily and are not properly maintained. For example, it's not uncommon for a fryer to catch fire from not having its oil changed weekly, or for an icecream machine to malfunction and not be able to produce icecream for hours at a time. 

Unless you are working in an "A-Unit", you will not have air conditioning or indoor plumbing. In my second year as a Team Lead, I worked in a "B-Unit" with 6 deep fryers on one side, a 400 degree grill and steamer on the opposite side, and had no air conditioning or fan. The doors were closed at all times to keep the bugs, geese, mice and skunks out of the unit. The closest washroom was in another unit that was about a 3-5 minute walk, depending on guest volume. 

In Summation: 
I do not recommend the Food and Beverage Department to anyone interested in working for this company. The above mentioned issues are only a fraction of the reality of working in this department. In actuality, there are several more alarming factors that negatively impact the job. The aforementioned are the most frequent and prevalent, in my opinion. 

If you are thinking of making quick money, the pay is not worth the amount of stress that comes with the job unless you have a large amount of patience. I have seen several people walk off the job throughout the season due to the high amount of emotional and environmental stress and pressure from fellow staff, supervisors, upper management and customers. 

A great place to gain food service experience would be at an established fast food company, such as Burger King, where I first started out as a cashier prior to accepting the higher paying job at Canada's Wonderland.

A typical day at work in the Guest Services Coordinator (now changed to Guest Services Associate as of 2014) position usually involves communicating directly with guests on a consistent basis. You will also occasionally be responding to guest inquiries via email or over the phone, so proper phone and email etiquette is required. You will be trained on how to do these things effectively by your supervisors, however it is a good asset to have going into the job. You will be responsible for giving guests information on current events as well as selling tickets and/or season passes as well.

You have to be prepared for guests to come to you with problems of any magnitude when you are on the job. From the common issues regarding clarification of ticket pricing to certain rare incidents that occur at the park, working at Canada's Wonderland can become very unpredictable. 

For me, personally, I loved working there mainly because of the people I worked with. No matter how stressful a shift I had, my co-workers made working there a lot more enjoyable. The management there is commendable. They are very respectful and treat you with courtesy every shift. 

There were many things that I've learned, including how to be patient. Patience is an absolute necessity for this position because it makes interacting with the guests you deal with a lot easier. Proper listening skills are also definitely required. Even the simplest of problems can be very difficult to solve if you don't have this. You also develop very creative problem-solving abilities as well, which is another characteristic that is a necessity to have. 

The hardest part of the job for me was having to deal with repetition. There were times that, no matter how clear I was with my explanations to the guests over company policies and what could and couldn't be done to assist them, I found it very difficult repeating the same thing over and over again. This became especially apparent on rain days when the rides are shut down temporarily during active weather. Guest Services was usually filled to capacity with guests trying to ask for their money back because they couldn't go on the rides during heavy rain.

As I stated earlier, the most enjoyable part of the job for me was being in a team environment. There were also a few perks such as various team events (ie; bowling, team dinners, etc) that can be planned throughout the season.

Overall, I would recommend this job to anyone who is willing. It is a great job and although opportunities to advance to higher positions are not frequent, it can provide others with useful skills to have in the future.

Typical day at work : 
Was generally on the day shift, would commute about half hour to get to the park at 9 to start at 9:25, unfortunately I worked at Minebuster which was at the complete opposite side of the park as the employee entrance so if you didn't get there at least 15 minutes early you were destined to be late. At the beginning I would start at the easier positions of the ride, grouper, loader, than after a while I was upgraded to being a Ride Operator which is 100% the best part of the job. Would work for a couple hours, rotating positions every hour, than go for a lunch/break. Pretty simple work but has alot to do with safety of the guests and making sure they're happy. 

What I learned:
To be diverse, I was previously living in Peterborough where their aren't alot of different races, cultures, religions, etc. Working at wonderland opened my eyes about different people and learning to work with groups who have different morals/beliefs. 

Management:
Management(Supervisor and Leads) were great, I had a guy named Jezer, he was awesome and always upbeat seemed to really love his job. If you were nice to they, did your job, and showed progression they would usually ease your rotation through the day.

Co-workers:
Had mostly great experiences with my co-workers. There were a few odd balls who didn't get along with a lot of people but for the most part I loved my crew. I lived 30-45 minutes away from the park and would still stay after my shift to go for dinner/drinks or the play some basketball with some of the crew. We became a family over the short time we spent together over the summer. You really need to take advantage of working there because if you are working part-time you are going to be around your crew alot of the summer.

Hardest part: 
2 that come to mind - 
Hot days, luckily minebuster's platform was under a roof so we had shade but it still got deathly(not literally) on some days, just make sure you wear lose uniforms and drink alot of water. 
Having to deal with rude/ immature customers, sometimes you experience a customer who is just having a bad day and the ride is taking a bit to start and you have to deal with their problems, even though you didn't do anything wrong you have to try to be nice and solve their problem. 

Most enjoyable: 
The downtime - when it wasn't that busy, or was getting closer to 8-10 when the park is closing, you can finally relax and talk to your crew after a long day. You have to get through a certain number of cycles per hour and when the park is empty alot of riders would ride continuously on our ride because they liked our crew so having fun with the guests was always a blast.

The most unorganized security department I've ever worked with. Managers and security supervisors don't function as they should be. And they built the whole department based on favoritism! Imagine that. Instead of promoting people who actually work and care about the job, they promote those who make friends with them or are close to them. The job site is perfect but they ruined the whole "City-like amusement park security guard" experience by having useless positions, favoritism and arrogance.

As an example of managers and supervisors being arrogant is every season they mock other security companies, their employees and their policies as though Canada's Wonderland is way better than them in a way that you can't even compare it. Instead of working on their problems they bring up other companies issues and fixate on them! Meanwhile Canada's Wonderland Security Department is like it's buildings; shiny and perfect from outside where people watch but dysfunctional and damaged from inside.

- If you think you're going to work there for experience, know that only 1 month is more than enough to gain all the experience they can give you since most of the times they give good positions to senior guards or their favorites (mostly senior guards). 

-if you think you're going there to earn money it's not worth it. Bag checking more than 1000 people per day doesn't worth getting paid 16,17,18 or 19$/hr.

- If you're going there to make friends, know that most of the guards are either arrogant or become arrogant because of the toxicity and the department atmosphere there which comes from upper management and some security supervisors and them distancing themselves from security guards. This, as ridiculous as it sounds is an actual issue that made a supervisor talk about guards feeling they're better than each other.


Obviously management is responsible the most for the situation in the department but they're not doing anything to fix it and even they promote it.

Not all Supervisors and senior guards are like as I stated and eventually here and there, you'll find a few guards that help you, are cooperative and can even make good friends

Managers and supervisors overall function and favoritism damaged the wonderland security department experience and Cedar Fair as a big company needs to look into it. Hope they change their ways and make working as security guard at Canada's Wonderland actually "Fun".

All in all, this is a pretty great summer job.  You get the benefit of having fun with kids and the Peanuts characters without having to put on a heavy, boiling hot costume.  Most days consist of alternating half hour walks with the characters and half hour breaks, with a dance show at the end of the day.  Half the time, you might have to perform dance parties with the characters at the front gate, or you might end up with Front Gate Snoopy who performs a show every couple hours all day.  Sometimes you might end up having to fill an usher shift, which seems really boring compared to being a cohort but its not bad.  If you sign up for this job be prepared a to dance and sweat in the heat in humidity for solid ten - fifteen minutes a day, plus a meet and greet; buy tons of sunscreen and be proud of that farmer's tan you will most definitely be getting.

The worst part of this job is definitely the pay is way too little for the amount of work that is done (especially for the characters).  Not to mention most of the costumes are in disrepair and are in desperate need of cleaning or just replacing.  A proper warm up was never implemented for the day's activities which often caused pain and injuries (again, especially for the characters) and most the time you just had to work through it.  Not to mention the Cedar Fair not understanding how humidity works and changing the heat protection system half way through the summer.  Speaking of PPE, they just need better PPE; ice vests are simply not enough when the humidity is at 90%.  Also, only having one restaurant for employees in a huge park who only get half hour lunch breaks is not okay.  You could use you employee discount at nearby concessions if you are lucky enough to not have a line, even then the discount is only 20% and there isn't much of a "healthy" option.

All this being said, I would still work there again, as cohort you do have it easier than the characters, and everything is worth it when you see children absolutely fall in love with Snoopy and the gang.

horrible experience, teams leads and supervisors are basically as educated as high school dropouts, and have the BIGGEST ego and act like they are everything. They have no skills in anything operations or management -related and should be fired asap. They are also RUDE to staff and will treat you badly. On top of that, there is a work til you drop environment where there is no concern for employee health or safety. If customers are rude and yell at you including taking pictures of you which is not allowed, supervisors will blame YOU and remind YOU to be nicer. A friend of mine had a video taken of her by a rude customer which was an invasion of privacy and managers did not do anything. Such a mess. Supervisors will treat like you are five years old and "scold" you over nothing when they are literally the same age and sometimes even younger. Totally unprofessional. Managers - your team leads will make the break schedule so they are in the shade all the time and leave the rest of us in the sun, despicable, unfair practices. Also supervisors will openly make fun of other employees which is completely unprofessional. In addition, there are rules which are so despicable such as not being able to drink from the water fountain because "customers" drink there and we have to drink from a dirty cooler often with bugs in it. Completely stupid and employees have gotten in trouble for drinking from the water fountain or walking around with a drink in the hot weather. People have also been SENT HOME after not having a belt, it is Wonderland not a CORPORATE JOB, so relax. ADVICE: DO NOT WORK HERE, RESPECT YOURSELF TO GET A JOB WHERE YOU ARE RESPECTED AND YOUR SAFETY IS BEING TAKEN SERIOUSLY. To all teenagers: work at walmart, mcodnalds, or anywhere for a summer job but NOT Wonderland! If you do GOOD LUCK and do not let this job stress you or bring you down because of how you are treated here, you are worth so much more and you are valued.

First of all, if you can't drive, then you have to take multiple buses, for me it was the VIVA bus, and those buses are always never on time, so you have to leave an hour earlier than anticipated to be able to arrive on time to Canada's Wonderland.

Secondly, it's not that you have to arrive at the gate for when your shift starts, but the location at where you work. So if you worked in a location that was a long walk away and you would have to be there at, for example, 6:30, then that means you would have to arrive at the gate a little earlier, as well as the time you have to leave to arrive.

As for break time, there is the most ridiculous system in that for when it is your time to eat whatever you brought. So you're not allowed to eat in the station you work, and have to walk to this separate building to eat. That takes a good couple of mins. Your break time is only 30 mins. That is not enough time to eat, plus the fact that you have to WALK to a SEPARATE BUILDING to each cuts time from your actual break time.
If you forgot to bring food or wish to purchase food from other food stations in the park, you are not allowed to be in uniformed and have to change into non-uniform clothes. That also takes a good couple of minutes out of your actual break time. So in reality, your overall time for actually eating and resting would be about 10 - 15 minutes, and that's ridiculous. 

Lastly, the WORST thing about working at Canada's Wonderland is the cleanup. The park may close at 11 pm, or 12 am, but being low on staff for cleanup is the worst. If you work in the Food & Beverage department like I did, you're staying a good 2 hours for cleanup. There is so much things to put away, food to dump out, and a butt-load of dishes to wash---it's a nightmare, especially for someone like me who was new.

Although Wonderland may be fun to go to for rides (even though lines are 1+ hour long waits), I would never work there ever again. Especially when it's Halloween Haunt as well. I seriously would not recommend Canada's Wonderland as anyone's first job.

Canada’s Wonderland is an unreliable and frustrating place to work. I did not receive training until two months into my contract leaving me two months behind on my summer earnings. Whenever I asked about training and when that would take place I received only very vague and unhelpful, almost rude answers that never directly answered my questions. Once I was trained for 3 hours they left me alone at my workstation with very little knowledge and high expectations of me. I was also not receiving full time hours even though I was scheduled five days a week. They would schedule me for five hour long shifts which don’t help a student trying to pay for school. The scheduling was another issue. Though they respected any time off requests made the schedule always came out 1-2 weeks late leaving no time to plan a personal life, as the new schedule would be released 2 days prior to it starting. The work itself was boring and dull as I worked in ride photo and was left alone for 5 hours at a time without anyone checking in on me more often then not. Another issue is that it was a weather dependant job and as soon as it rained my hours and therefore my earnings would be cut significantly. Canada’s Wonderland is not a good place to work if you intend on making a significant amount of money in a short period of time as they say in your contract that you are a full time employee for the summer but hardly give you part time hours. The management is just a little useless in that regard. Towards the end of the season when many employees resigned they would call me in early for a shift and expect me to show up for a 10-hour shift on a 45 minutes notice and while I appreciated the extra hours the notice was just too short and my personal and social life was compromised. Overall I did not have a positive experience of working at Canada’s Wonderland and would not recommend it.

During a typical day of work, I would enter the park and pass security through the employee entrance, and I would report to the "Refresh" office and clock in for my shift. I would then sign in on the payroll roster and record what time I clocked in for my shift. I would then travel to different drink kiosks throughout the park and refill empty machines with ice and drink syrups. I would have to bring boxes up to 30 lbs to each station and refill insert them into the machines and keep a record of all syrups that were taken from storage or transferred from one kiosk location to another. After 4 1/2 hours of working, I would clock out for my 30 minute break and walk to the employee cafeteria for lunch before clocking back in for my shift. I would then continue working until my shift ends and clean the drink machines before the park closes.
I learned that even though customer interaction was limited in the department I was working in, communication skills were still useful and that employers tend to appreciate when workers complete their work on time and with care even if the demand of the job is lower than it is in other departments.
The management staff were approachable and willing to compromise when discussing difficulties in the workplace with workers.
The hardest part of the job was learning how to appropriately discuss workplace issues with my manager, especially regarding other coworkers involved.
The most enjoyable part of the job was traveling to different stations on the floor and having the opportunity to get acquainted with my coworkers. This allowed me to understand how to adapt to different personalities and use it to complete the tasks assigned.

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Lifeguard 7 salaries reported	$19.86 per hour
Landscape technician 18 salaries reported	$21.34 per hour
Food & beverage supervisor 5 salaries reported	$19.30 per hour
Performer 8 salaries reported	$19.14 per hour
Guest service agent 10 salaries reported	$18.03 per hour

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