Choosing the Right Employee Benefit Plan: Traditional or Self-Funded?

Choosing the right employee benefit plan depends on factors like company size, risk tolerance, and financial stability. However, your chosen plan impacts your school’s budget and ability to attract and retain faculty and staff.

In this webinar, ISM Employee Benefits Account Managers Antoinette Goodman and Liz Schaeffer will break down the key differences between and implementation processes of fully insured, level-funded, and self-insured employee benefits plans.

From Day One to Year One: Ensuring New Leaders Thrive

Successful school leadership transitions require a well-prepared community and a clear integration plan. Without this, new leaders face preventable challenges that put them at a disadvantage from day one.

Join Chris Massaro, Partner, The Source Advisory, and Keith Evans, President of Westminster Schools in GA, as they discuss how private-independent school senior leaders and boards can ensure smooth transitions through clear communication, structured support, and community engagement. Learn how your team can play a crucial role in setting new leaders up for long-term success.

Data That Drives Decisions: Essentials for Admission and Enrollment Success

Understanding and managing admission funnel, enrollment, and re-enrollment data is essential for effective enrollment planning. There are key data points that all schools should be collecting and analyzing throughout the admission process.

Join Casey Bell, ISM Consultant, as she describes the keys to a foundational understanding of admission and enrollment data. Discover how to interpret and apply core data points to project enrollment and inform your planning and enrollment strategies.

6 Tips for Getting the Most Out of Professional Development

In the process of preparing to teach a couple of professional development workshops for ISM, I got to thinking about the students who have gotten the most out of their experiences — and why. What has been the difference for those with tangible, measurable results versus those who check in, check out, and don’t move the needle when they get back to their schools?

Five Things Every Head and Trustee Needs to Know about Marketing

Independent schools face an increasingly competitive landscape, where shifts in demographics, technology, and family expectations pose challenges to traditional admission and marketing approaches. Heads and trustees play a critical role in ensuring the long-term financial sustainability of their schools, yet many are unsure of how to support admission, enrollment management, and marketing communications in strategic ways.

Your Survey Is Complete — Now What? Part 2: Analyzing Your Results

Your surveys are complete, and the data is ready to review — where do you start? The volume of information can feel overwhelming, and data misinterpreted or misused can be more detrimental than no data at all. Missteps can lead to divisiveness among faculty, misguided decision-making, and even public relations challenges with legal ramifications.

“I Don’t Have Time for that Webinar!” and Other Obstacles to Professional Growth

Private school professionals are encouraged — even expected — to pursue professional development regularly. But do you ever feel like you’re not seizing those opportunities as often as you should? You're not alone.

Creating a Culture of Giving and Getting Involved: Research Report

As a private school development director, you have two primary responsibilities: meet your goals for raising funds and play your part in achieving the aims of the school’s strategic plan and strategic financial plan.

To measure whether your development operation reflects industry-recommended practices and is positioned to meet your goals, ISM suggests examining four factors: