The ISM Members-Only Podcast

Five Steps to Invest in Your Faculty and Increase Retention

How do you develop a school culture that helps teachers thrive and feel supported, and encourages them to stay? Especially as you approach all that is involved in the hiring season?
In this webinar, Meredith Monk Ford, Executive Director at Folio Collaborative, walks you through a specific conversation strategy you can use that demonstrates your investment in your teachers while uncovering how to sustain their commitment to your school. This strategy builds on five concepts that help foster a school culture that encourages teachers to stay for the long term: putting people first, taking purposeful action, creating clarity, honoring reflection, and making time for celebration.

Using Analytics to Boost Your Spring Annual Giving Plan

Too often, development teams focus on participation, using the same techniques they used in the fall to meet their spring fundraising goals—casting a big net and hoping to see results. But using analytics to determine your target demographic can help you meet your goals more effectively.
During this webinar, Phil Higginson, IAP-L, Associate Head of School for Philanthropy at Ravenscroft School in Raleigh, NC, will share his techniques for adjusting and planning a spring solicitation strategy based on analytics. Not only will you understand how this data is derived and how to apply your findings, but you’ll learn stewardship techniques and how to assess constituencies to meet your spring annual giving goals.

The Foundations of Strategic Financial Planning

Today’s economic climate continues to pose challenges for School Heads and school Finance Committees. Concerns about inflation, teacher salaries amid the personnel shortage, and the tuition-setting process for the coming year are chief among every school's financial considerations.
Strategic planning helps reset a school’s direction to bring about meaningful institutional growth. In this webinar, Terry Moore—ISM Executive Consultant, Governance and Finance Department Head, and Platinum Executive Coach—will present the necessary elements of a strategic financial plan. Learn how to develop several financial planning scenarios so the Leadership Team and the Board feel confident their strategic financial plan sets their school on the path to success in an uncertain market.

Managing Parent Expectations in Your Enrollment Management Process

The expectations of today’s applicant parents are greater than ever before, and understanding the perspective they bring to the enrollment process is essential.
Join Casey Bell, IACP-L, ISM Adjunct Faculty and Director of Enrollment Management at All Saints Episcopal School, TX, explore the relationships between your school and your applicant parents. Learn how to integrate your parents into every step of the admission “funnel,” manage their expectations while establishing boundaries, and use the enrollment contract to articulate the relationships between the school and your families.

ChatGPT: The Game-Changing Technology for Private School Marketers

You’ve probably heard of the revolutionary new AI language model, ChatGPT. And now you’re wondering:
Do I really need to learn how to use it?
Is this just a fad?
How can this new system actually help with our school’s marketing?
Aren’t the outputs too basic and generic?
As a fellow marketer who has spent over 200 hours studying ChatGPT and implementing it in my own marketing efforts, I can confidently tell you it is a game-changer!
The problem is, many people don't know how to use it to its full potential.
After this webinar, you will have the exact strategies and ChatGPT prompts to save you hours, and even days, executing your most critical marketing tasks.

School Culture in 2023: Why We Must Pay Attention Right Now

In this webinar, Scott Wilson—ISM Executive Leadership Department Head and Platinum Executive Coach—will explore the importance of school culture and why school leaders must consider it closely now. He’ll also discuss how school culture relates to student and parent satisfaction, as well as faculty and staff recruitment and retention.

Out With Interviews, in With Performance Assessments

The hiring process is a time-consuming endeavor, especially when it comes to interviews and assessments. How do you ensure your evaluation methods capture the most information about a candidate in the limited time available?
Performance assessments are an excellent way to determine if a candidate possesses the values and mission-specific qualities you seek. In this webinar, Shannan Schuster—ISM Consultant and Platinum Executive Coach—explores how incorporating performance assessments can provide more comprehensive information than other methods.

Focusing on Culture IS Focusing on Teaching

Ensuring teacher effectiveness and student learning is essential to sustain your school’s primary purpose: education. For decades, school administrators have used classroom observation as their primary method of judging teachers’ success. These classroom visits, however, often force teachers to change their classroom routine to satisfy the observation protocol.

SUCCESSion Planning

In today’s challenging employment environment, succession planning has become a vital part of organizational sustainability. Independent schools operate in unique ways that reflect the rich mosaic of skills, talents, styles, and passions of those who lead. But, despite the uniqueness of each school culture, there are universal do’s and don'ts when planning for succession for any role.

5 Steps to Creating a Coaching Program to Ensure Faculty Growth

Growth-oriented teachers are a hallmark of a great school. Conversely, teachers who do not model the growth they want to see in their students often fail over time.
Explore how to build a team of faculty leaders who coach and support one another. This creates a collaborative and collegial faculty community that grows in their professional practice every school year.