Perhaps your school has a preschool, or is thinking about adding one. Perhaps you see preschool as a doorway into full enrollment at your school. But is it worth it? In short, does it meet the needs of your families, your students, and your school’s mission?
Academic leaders, parents, and researchers believe a quality preschool program improves skills like simple math and phonics, and prepares children for the social and emotional behaviors as they enter kindergarten and elementary school. For example, a study in Virginia last year, including more than 20,000 students in a government-funded preschool program, indicated that children in the system showed great improvements in alphabet recognition. But do the benefits of preschool extend into student experience in later schooling?
The Department Chair’s Role in Supporting Multiyear Strategic Goals
ISM recommends six-year strategic and strategic financial plans that are completely redone every four years (so Years Five and Six are never implemented, but serve as guideposts for the subsequent six-year plan). Many schools also have an accompanying Strategic Academic Plan aligned with the strategic plan and strategic financial plan, resourced through the annual budget.
Paying Your Summer Program Director
As the Business Manager, how should you think about the Summer Program Director position? It can include diverse roles and responsibilities and so there is no single or simple answer. For some schools, this is a full-time position with over 1,000 students participating over eight weeks. For others, it is a nascent program of two weeks with 80 participants.1 Methods of compensation are equally diverse. A cross-section of typical attitudes includes:
FTE with salary and benefits (usually including extended care through the year);
an addition to a full-time position, such as teacher with a stipend attached; and
for the person directing the program, his or her children attend for free for the summer.
For Parents to Trust You With the Big Things, First Take Care of the Little Things
Schools frequently wish they enjoyed more positive interactions with parents. Teachers often lament the “good old days,” when parents trusted teachers and school administrators almost implicitly—and would not question, let alone protest, the advice or approach of educational professionals.
Parents still evaluate what happens at school through the lens of their own educational experiences, or the experiences of their older children. They may also bring expert information to bear—even the findings of educational research—on their ongoing conversation with school community members about their children’s progress and learning experiences.
Creating Divisional and Departmental Mission Statements
The Board of Trustees and the School Head are entrusted with creation of the school’s mission statement; that is amplified through development of the Portrait of the Graduate and the Characteristics of Professional Excellence. Collectively, these documents are called Purpose and Outcome Statements. What do they mean, however, for the life of each division and department?
Maintaining Costs for Summer Program Directors
Summer programs are often run as completely separate educational programs regarding budgeting, scheduling, planning, curriculum, and staffing. Although part of your schools culture, and commonly sharing its mission, these programs typically don’t share budgets or administrative support. For the Summer Program Director with full-time responsibilities as part of the faculty or Administrative Team, the burden of the summer camp silo can be an overwhelming one.
Strengthen Your Outdoor Education Program
Outdoor education has a long and distinguished history in private-independent schools. Whether it involves an annual trip or is a yearlong component of the curriculum, administrators cite various benefits to these programs: personal growth, development of social skills and self-confidence, health and fitness, teamwork, whole student education, fun and recreation, and enhancement of a positive school culture.
As you develop, expand, or assess your school’s own outdoor education program, determine how effectively you address these fundamental areas.
Can a Talented Teacher Be a Good Administrator?
The answer, of course, is a qualified “yes.” As the School Head, you have a vested interest in identifying administrative talent. When you find a teacher who can take charge of an operational area—however small—you relieve yourself or another Administrative Team member of a burden. This may even free time to devote to other imminent tasks and issues.
Professional Development: Five Worst Practices
As a Division Head, your most critical responsibility is to increase the capacity of your teachers. You may be in the process of reevaluating your school’s professional development with this in mind. Here are the five worst practices that ISM often witnesses in schools, and the recommendations that go with them.
Educational Specifications: The Foundation for the Facility of Your Dreams
Any professional, knowledgeable architect will ask your school for educational specifications—a definition of the “who, what, when, why, and how” for each space in the structure. These “building blocks” make the difference between a generic, restrictive structure and one specifically designed to:
support your school’s mission;
meet the needs of your program;
serve the students, faculty, and staff who use the building daily; and
stay within your budget constraints.