Q: We’re planning to dismiss a long-serving teacher at the end of the school year. We don’t have any documentation, though. Should we start a “warning” process now?

There has been considerable discussion and debate in private school board rooms, administrative offices, and faculty lounges in recent years regarding “merit pay” (also known as “pay for performance”). While this type of pay arrangement is common in virtually every environment outside of schools, it is still a relatively novel concept in the private-independent school world. Today, we’d like to take a look at issues of motivation, fairness, and retention with respect to merit pay systems.

As the first signs of Spring appear in many parts of the country, thoughts turn to the reawakening Earth, planting of fields and flowers, and all things that speak to growth. With this as our theme, we want to share with you a story—based on true events, as they say—that sheds some light on the need to “prepare the ground” when launching any significant change event.

Meetings are talked about too little and carried out too much. Most schools spend a great deal of time in meetings of one kind or another—e.g., Board committees, the School Head and the Management Team, the Division Heads together with Department Chairs or grade team leaders, the Student Response Team, and faculty meetings. Of course, it is valuable and often essential that people come together in a formal sense and talk about difference-makers in the lives of children. Group networks aggregate information and can examine it more critically. Group members often will determine better solutions and/or outcomes than isolated individuals—but only if the group meets in a way that allows these things to happen. Here, then, are ISM’s Ten Essential Rules for Productive Meetings.

The Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice recently released a report focusing on school choice programs in 2013, including vouchers, education savings accounts, tax-credit scholarships, and individual tax credits/deductions. The report describes programs throughout the United States, listed alphabetically by state.

The Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice has just released its 2013 edition of The ABCs of School Choice, a comprehensive guide to every kind of private school choice program available in the United States. Currently, 21 states and Washington, DC offer some formass of private school choice.

During the past year, ISM’s Consultants have been writing and speaking on the primary role of academic leaders as building the capacity of their faculty—that is, coaching, mentoring, supporting, and guiding faculty toward delivering your mission with excellence every day, with every student. This is a lofty goal, of course—but one that we passionately believe is vital to the success of private schools in the 21st century. This begs the question: If academic leaders (e.g., Division Heads and Department Chairs) are coaching faculty, who coaches the coaches?

Spring is right around the corner. With warmer weather, field trips are likely to start springing up on calendars in an effort to connect theory and practice. With any off-site trip, you need to follow safety policies to reduce risks. This is a good time to review your school’s policies for faculty and volunteers accompanying students off campus. Start by defining what a field trip is. Some schools consider any event that takes students off-site as a field trip, while others define them as travel greater than 10 miles from campus. Once you have your school’s definition determined, the following guidelines may help you polish your school’s protocols.

Sexting—sending or receiving sexually explicit images or texts—incidents have been on the rise since 2008. In 2010, sexting concerns in schools started making headlines on a regular basis. Now in 2013, schools are still trying to gain control of harassment lawsuits and negative media. The truth is, no one in your school has the power to control each individual. You will never be able to eliminate the risk completely. But you can protect your school by revising antiharassment and e-mail policies to include cell phones, cameras, IMs, and texts. Whether you have one policy that covers both students and employees or separate policies for employees and students, it needs to be updated to reflect new risks that these devices represent.

Optimizing your schools space takes a considerable amount of thought, meditation, and planning. Adequate space is valuable—especially for inner-city schools. Well-planned space that incorporates green spaces as well as modern adaptations for 21st Century learning inspires, motivates, and promotes the learning environment not just for your students, but also for your school’s faculty and staff.