UPDATE: The flu has officially reached widespread activity in most states. What does "widespread" mean? It means that more than 50% of geographic regions in a state, counties for example, are reporting flu activity.

Q: Our health insurance company added a surcharge for each participant in our health plan starting last month, January. This charge is not just on our employees but also on their dependents. What is the basis of the charge and can we pass it on to our employees?

Open a newspaper or your home page and you’ll see dozens of stories about data misuse, like this parent who faces felony charges for changing her children’s grades or this student who posted thousands of student records on an anonymous online forum. These security breaches should be anticipated and guarded against, but sometimes the question lies in not who got into your network, but what information you’re keeping there.

Editorial by ISM Staff Writer My mother always taught me that it’s rude to ask a lady’s age. Nowadays, it goes beyond impoliteness: Age is a legally protected, non-discriminatory class, just like gender or race. But laws don’t stop the spread of generational stereotypes, young or old. It’s high-past time for someone to take a stand against the (often negative) stereotypes older people tend to believe about my peers and me. I’ve decided—for this article, at least—for that person to be me, a bonafide Generation Y young adult in the workforce.

Tuition remission for faculty and staff means so many things to so many private-independent schools. To some, it’s a way to promote the school’s mission of inclusion. To others, it’s a perk, a way to find and retain wonderful staff and faculty. Even more people remember their own education or a friend whose schooling was supported through programs like this and wish to continue the tradition. ISM theory, as we’ve written in The Tuition Book and discussed during podcasts, states that it’s possible to accomplish your mission of caring and trust without offering hugely expensive (and potentially unnecessary) discounts. Don’t believe it? Let’s tackle some common arguments in favor of tuition remission and outline some ways to keep the program’s positives.

Why do people work for private-independent schools? They want to support their school’s mission, of course, which could deal with everything from religion to academic abilities to unique educational experiences, but one thing is certain: We guarantee that no one works at your school merely “for the money.”

The winter holidays have come and gone, but there’s no reason we can’t continue celebrating the new year with a renewed commitment to personal development! More so than many offices in a private-independent school, the Development Office must maintain a presence in the community and in the other divisions of the school. With that balance in mind, we have collected a few books for your consideration and perusal.

The school year’s halfway done, but turning over a new leaf doesn’t need to wait until next New Year’s. Grab your wallet and prep your library card, because we’ve put together a list of some must-read books for your professional development resolutions for 2014.

Winter has settled in with a vengeance in the Northern Hemisphere, heralded by the recent “Polar Vortex.” While the temperatures have slowly risen back to seasonal averages, the question of how to handle outdoor recess in the face of extreme cold has been raised on our Lower School Head/Division Head e-List. There are no national regulations beyond the common-sense meter, but when you’re bracing for wind chills that make the world feel colder than Mars, you know it’s time to set some ground rules for future arctic blasts.

As we head into enrollment season for Student Accident coverages, we’ve come across some interesting statistics for sports-related injuries. What parents and your school administrators don’t want to hear is that the Journal of Pediatrics published a study reporting a 92% increase in pediatric visits to hospital emergency rooms for sports-related traumatic brain injuries between 2002 and 2011. What you and your families will want to know is that the severity of these cases appears to be decreasing.