Health care Reform—With the 2012 election now over, it is clear that the PPACA health care reform legislation that was passed in 2010 will be fully implemented. Please check with your benefits adviser to determine where the school’s benefits program stands regarding requirements coming into place in 2013 and 2014.

Consultant Susan Howlett, author of the book Boards on Fire!, was charged with training a trails-based nonprofit’s Board to ask for major gifts. When she broached the issue, she said they were highly resistant.

As Development Director, your duties are in full swing—annual campaign, volunteer training, event management, year-end giving campaign around the corner, donor cultivation and stewardship, maybe even a capital campaign to boot. With all that activity, its amazing you have time to breathe, let alone take time to take care of yourself. But it’s important to give yourself permission to see to your own needs. Don’t collapse under all the pressure! Here’s a few ideas to help you balance.

Parallel surveys of Chief Executive Officers and Chief Development Officers at community colleges reveal significant gaps in perspectives by these senior leaders with respect to fund-raising goals, resources, and their respective roles.

Recently in her Fundraising Wisdom blog, consultant Carol Weisman outlined five ways to ensure your Development Director leaves your organization in less than five years. While she is directing her barbs more at nonprofits overall, her wisdom certainly applies in many ways to private-independent schools.

Q: We're having a debate within our administrative team about whether we should continue to offer contracts to teachers, or not. What is ISM's recommendation?

As human beings, we’re all apt to “miss the forest for the trees” on occasion. Nowhere is this truer than in organizations, especially regarding performance reviews. Here is a story from outside the world of education that may help us see a few truths pertinent to teacher evaluations within private-independent schools.

We’ve entered the fall harvest season, with apple, cranberry, and pumpkin festivals abound. This brings to mind the question whether we allow “a few bad apples to spoil the bunch”—or whether prudent “pruning” will help our orchards thrive in the years to come.

Word-of-mouth marketing is the most powerful marketing you can invest time in. There is no budget to consider, no approval to seek, no research to undertake. It’s merely tossing a topic of conversation out to the masses and waiting for it to grow to a roar. Right?

If your school has a thriving summer program that attracts students not just from your school but from neighboring schools as well, you have a pool of recruiting potential at your fingertips. But you’re thinking, “I don’t want to come across as I’m taking advantage of the situation.” You don’t have to. We have subtle tips that will help you work with the Summer Program Director to pique the interest of your summer attending families.