Better Boards, Better Schools: The ISM Guide for Private School Trusteeship and Strategic Governance


Book Description

Being a member of the Board of Trustees for a private school is certainly an honor. You are asked to take into your care a school--to ensure that each student's education fulfills the school's mission, and that all students are nurtured and developed to their benefit. You must carry out that care by providing support-resources-to the School Head. Your relationship to the school-as with all Trustees--determines whether your school will be successful in the long term.Being a Board member is also somewhat puzzling. If you're like many Trustees, you're not sure how it happened. Maybe you were approached at a social event. Maybe another Board member had talked to you a while ago about it on the phone; you may even have forgotten the conversation. Maybe you were serving on a committee and this seemed the next logical step. You've become a private school Trustee.Now what?This book is based on more than four decades of working with the Boards of hundreds of private schools. Independent School Management (ISM) has honed its research and recommendations over those years to provide the best possible service to our schools. We hope you'll find the following theory and advice valuable as you better prepare your Board to plan for your school's future. Chapters include: * The Role of the Trustee* The Board's Foundation and Strategic Structures* Understanding Private School Finances* Strategic Planning and Strategic Financial Planning* The ISM Stability Markers* Purpose and Outcome Statements* ISM Success Predictors* Recruiting and Orienting Board Members* The Board Committees* Board Meetings and Other Functions* Board-School Head Relationships* The Board's Role in Fundraising* Strategic Board Assessment* A Sample Board Commitment and Trustee HandbookIndependent School Management (ISM) is a family owned company dedicated to the advancement of private school management. ISM reaches over 7,000 private-independent schools, and serves over 200,000 students annually with advice, assistance, and creative solutions. Administrators in private schools of all types and sizes turn to ISM for advice and assistance on an array of management challenges, including student recruitment and retention, fundraising, strategic and long-range planning, Board-Head relations, personnel, plant expansion, mergers, leadership training, and creative insurance solutions.This book is based on more than four decades of working with the Boards of hundreds of private schools. We've honed our research and recommendations over those years to provide the best possible service to our schools. We hope you'll find the following theory and advice valuable as you better prepare your Board to plan for your school's future




Healthy Boards, Successful Schools


Book Description

There is no calling, no more vital responsibility, than the education of our nation's and world's future leaders. Independent and faith-based schools succeed and thrive in the presence of visionary leadership. In its absence, schools struggle and often fail to achieve their mission. The success story for schools is the strength of the leadership found in the relationship between the head of school, the board chair, and all trustees. It is through this relationship, partnership, and acceptance of roles and responsibilities where this health and this success can be found.




Understanding Independent School Parents


Book Description

Understanding Independent School Parents is a practical guide for teachers provides advice for forging successful relationships with independent school parents. Written by a seasoned school psychologist and an experienced classroom teacher, this book aims to help teachers and administrators understand today's families and maintain healthy relationships with them. Readers will learn how to create school environments that support both teachers and parents, make the most of parent conferences, and manage those disruptive and difficult "five percenter" parents who can make a teacher's life miserable.




Finance Fundamentals for Nonprofits


Book Description

A complete guide to the financial requirements a nonprofit organization must follow to indefinitely maintain the volume and quality of their services An organization may have plenty of capacity in the long run, but in the short run, donor restrictions and limited financing options are constraining. Here-and-now liquid assets are the only resources available. Finance Fundamentals for Nonprofits: Building Capacity and Sustainability shows how to measure a nonprofit organization's financial capacity in different time frames and how to measure its ability to sustain capacity in each case. Explains how nonprofits differ from businesses and how they promote values-centered management Reveals how to improve financial capacity and sustainability Written by a nonprofit scholar Filled with real-world case studies and actionable advice relating financial health to financial capacity and sustainability, this book is essential reading for every nonprofit professional.




Comprehensive Faculty Development


Book Description

Independent School Management developed this guide for schools in answering this question: How do we ensure that we have a great faculty that teaches with excellence and ultimately increases student performance, satisfaction, and enthusiasm? By supporting teachers, your school supports students and helps ensure your institution's long-term growth and success. So this book is not about teachers-it is really about students. We believe, by implementing the processes and procedures found here, your school ultimately increases student performance, satisfaction, and enthusiasm. ..... Anyone who works with faculty should keep this invaluable book close at hand.




U.S. Education Reform and National Security


Book Description

The United States' failure to educate its students leaves them unprepared to compete and threatens the country's ability to thrive in a global economy and maintain its leadership role. This report notes that while the United States invests more in K-12 public education than many other developed countries, its students are ill prepared to compete with their global peers. According to the results of the 2009 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), an international assessment that measures the performance of 15-year-olds in reading, mathematics, and science every three years, U.S. students rank fourteenth in reading, twenty-fifth in math, and seventeenth in science compared to students in other industrialized countries. The lack of preparedness poses threats on five national security fronts: economic growth and competitiveness, physical safety, intellectual property, U.S. global awareness, and U.S. unity and cohesion, says the report. Too many young people are not employable in an increasingly high-skilled and global economy, and too many are not qualified to join the military because they are physically unfit, have criminal records, or have an inadequate level of education. The report proposes three overarching policy recommendations: implement educational expectations and assessments in subjects vital to protecting national security; make structural changes to provide students with good choices; and, launch a "national security readiness audit" to hold schools and policymakers accountable for results and to raise public awareness.




The Jossey-Bass Handbook of Nonprofit Leadership and Management


Book Description

The go-to nonprofit handbook, updated and expanded for today's leader The Jossey-Bass Handbook of Nonprofit Leadership and Management is the bestselling professional reference and leading text on the functions, processes, and strategies that are integral to the effective leadership and management of nonprofit and nongovernmental organizations. Now in its fourth edition, this handbook presents the most current research, theory, and practice in the field of nonprofit leadership and management. This practical, relevant guide is invaluable to the effective practice of nonprofit leadership and management, with expanded attention to accountability, transparency, and organizational effectiveness. It also extensively covers the practice of social entrepreneurship, presented via an integrative perspective that helps the reader make practical sense of how to bring it all together. Nonprofit organizations present unique opportunities and challenges for meeting the needs of societies and their communities, yet nonprofit management is more complex and challenging than ever. This Handbook provides a framework to help you lead and manage efficiently and effectively in this new environment. Building on solid current scholarship, the handbook provides candid, practical guidance from nationally-recognized leaders who share their insights on: The relationship between board performance and organizational effectiveness Managing internal and external stakeholder relationships Financial viability and sustainability and how to enhance both for the long term Strategies to successfully attract, retain, and mobilize the very best of staff and volunteers The fourth edition of the handbook also includes content relevant to associations and membership organizations. The content of the handbook is supplemented and enriched by an extensive set of online supplements and tools, including reading lists, web references, checklists, PowerPoint slides, discussion guides, and sample exams. Running your nonprofit or nongovernmental organization effectively in today's complex and challenging environment demands more knowledge and skill than ever, deployed in a thoughtful and pragmatic way. Grounded in the most useful modern scholarship and theory, and explained from the perspective of effective practice, The Jossey-Bass Handbook of Nonprofit Leadership and Management is a pivotal resource for successful nonprofit leaders in these turbulent times.




Economic Security: Neglected Dimension of National Security ?


Book Description

On August 24-25, 2010, the National Defense University held a conference titled “Economic Security: Neglected Dimension of National Security?” to explore the economic element of national power. This special collection of selected papers from the conference represents the view of several keynote speakers and participants in six panel discussions. It explores the complexity surrounding this subject and examines the major elements that, interacting as a system, define the economic component of national security.




Schools of Thought


Book Description

As a result of his visits to classrooms across the nation, Brown has compiled an engaging, thought-provoking collection of classroom vignettes which show the ways in which national, state, and local school politics translate into changed classroom practices. "Captures the breadth, depth, and urgency of education reform".--Bill Clinton.




Guide to Governing Shared Community Facilities


Book Description

"A Guide to Governing Shared Community Facilities has been designed to provide practical tools and guidelines for parties and individuals planning or operating a shared community facility"--Introd.