As School Head, you want every student to be successful. Each student and parent likely comes with the assumption that, if mission-appropriate, the child will “win” at the game of school. The school promises to deliver its mission to all students, not just most of them. As we consider how to deliver the mission with excellence to each student, there is a hidden assumption that the classroom is an equal opportunity environment. Exceptional governance practices (including strategic planning and strategic financial planning) and your actions as School Head in leading faculty are key components of sustaining future success.

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A previous I&P article provided an overview of the elements of agenda-making for the Board and the School Head. This article, the second in the series, details how to develop the annual Board agenda. The annual Board agenda is one of the focal points in ISM’s data-informed approach to strategic Board structure and function. After your Board of Trustees and senior administration have developed a strategic plan/strategic financial plan that conforms to ISM criteria, you, as Board President, with advice and counsel from the Committee on Trustees (COT), will create an annual Board agenda that sets out the governance-level tasks for the upcoming year. Once the committee chairs have accepted their assignments along with their (written) committee charges and deadlines, the annual Board agenda can be finalized and introduced to the Board as a whole.

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As a member of the Board of Trustees, School Head, or Chief Financial Officer, you know that a decision to hold tuition flat for a year results in lost ground and places pressure on future budgets. Inflation quietly depletes your real income. But it’s worse than you think. Many schools use the Urban Consumer Price Index (CPI-U) to determine inflation year-to-year.1 However, the CPI-U does not reflect expenses in private schools, and may not reflect your state’s—or even your city’s—true rate of inflation. For example, the annual rates of inflation in San Francisco, San Diego, New York City, Los Angeles, and Washington DC are typically higher than most other cities in the country. Thus, the CPI-U should only serve as a base figure. There are compelling arguments for adjusting your tuition at a rate above the inflation rate in your school’s particular area.

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Setting the annual agendas by the Board President and School Head is a key skill for executing the strategic plan/strategic financial plan. No matter how great the strategic plan and strategic financial plan are, they remain inert and powerless unless they are annually tethered to an actionable process. Using annual agendas turns them into the difference-makers that move the school forward.

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As Facilities Director, Business Manager, or Chair of the Building and Grounds Committee in a school that includes young children, your role has changed dramatically over the past decade. You must consider not just the safety and prestige of your buildings, but also its ability to support and impact student learning. In this article, we explore research indicating what effective buildings can do to improve learning environments. This is not about innovative architecture but about the connection between light, sound, temperature, etc., and learning, what is known as internal environmental quality (IEQ).

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Research and experience has led ISM to hypothesize that the School Head’s well-being significantly relates to school outcomes. ISM recently conducted a study of School Heads to extend our knowledge of executive leadership and investigate the relationship among our Tier 1 markers of the ISM Stability Markers®, School Heads’ characteristics and experience, and their well-being. In upcoming I&P issues, we will publish the more nuanced results of this study. The purpose of this article is to re-introduce our approach to the measurement of executive leadership and describe the general results and conclusions. Great leaders can transform a school and take it to new heights, whereas poor leaders can cause great challenges for schools. We have long asserted that, as the executive leader, your “style” does not seem to account for the differences in organizational performance. Nonetheless, you are a critical component of a school’s ability to deliver its mission with excellence. If it is not style, then what are the critical aspects of executive leaders that separate the best leaders from the rest?

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As Admission Director, you are an expert at building relationships and cultivating enthusiasm about the educational opportunities your school offers for each child and family. While some admission professionals use the initial prospective family conversation to promote enthusiasm for the school’s philanthropic endeavors—some do not. Some actively resist any notion of addressing the school’s philanthropic pursuits during the admission cultivation experience, fearing the prospective family will lose interest in pursuing enrollment. In fact, the opposite is true. Families appreciate being fully informed about the mission trajectory of the school—and actively seek an accurate expression of costs, expectations, and community responsibilities.

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ISM has consistently applauded schools’ efforts to continue to connect with students once they have graduated or left the school. While ISM has been skeptical about the willingness of alumni to give to their pre-collegiate institutions, that situation seems to be changing. Indeed, day schools are joining boarding schools in carefully cultivating and engaging their alumni.The result is willingness for alumni to volunteer, assist current students with networking opportunities and a marked increase in giving from this important constituent group.

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As Business Manager or Facilities Manager, you know that providing housekeeping services is not just about “cleaning.” It’s about how people are motivated to serve “customers.” The challenge for administrators is to provide consistent and continuing leadership to these employees, enabling them to deliver excellent service daily, while keeping an eye on the bottom line. If no one has communicated your housekeeping standards, this often creates confusion and misunderstanding among both your housekeeping staff and their “customers”—your school’s Board, faculty and staff, parents, and students.

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ISM periodically re-analyzes, reconfigures, and updates its list of Stability Markers. The ISM Stability Markers® are in continual and widespread use in the private-independent school world as reliable guideposts in strategic planning and strategic financial planning. As Board President or School Head, you may find it helpful to consider the Stability Markers’ opposite extremes—private-independent school practices that, from ISM’s perspective, are likely to contribute to “strategic instability.” This article may be especially useful in teaching situations, such as in your annual new-Trustee orientation or in presentations to constituents outside the Board and senior administration.

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