Virtual & Onsite Consulting Services

Onsite Consulting
Onsite Consulting

Ensure that your school’s governance and operations support your mission.

We work together with your leaders, teachers, staff members, and students to understand your school’s unique needs, strengths, and challenges. We help you create a plan to help you meet your goals.

Your team can then put these mission-appropriate recommendations into action to achieve increased cash reserves, higher enrollment levels, and long-term stability. At the end of the day, we all have a singular purpose—advance school leadership to enrich the student experience.

We offer personalized consultations for many leadership divisions of a private school—the Board of Trustees, School Heads, the Business Office, the Development Office, Enrollment Management professionals, Marketing professionals, and Academic leaders. Select the area of school leadership you’d like to further explore.

 

Our Consulting Services

School Head

Whether you want to ensure that all school functions run at peak efficiency or are considering implementing new strategies and initiatives, lean on a trusted source of knowledge to increase the likelihood of long-term success.

Business & Operations

Take advantage of a full range of planning, facilities, and operations consulting services that give your school a solid footing for the future. Examine where your key operations work well, and where they can use improvement.

Academic Leadership

Your programs set your school apart. Explore how to create and build programs that pull families in and give them an experience they couldn’t have at another private-independent school.

Admission & Enrollment Management

ISM’s data-informed approach pinpoints what attracts families to your school and inspires them to stay. Receive customized solutions based on your school’s unique marketplace stance, challenges, and opportunities.

Fundraising & Development

Learn how to develop successful strategies to engage and bring donors closer to your institution. No matter your school size, history, or pedagogy, explore how to plan, implement, and evaluate your fundraising strategies to realize your full potential.

Marketing Communications

Explore how to share exceptional stories of student learning, engagement, and outcomes, and illustrate how these can become differentiators that distinguish your school from your competitors.

Board of Trustees

The Board must focus its efforts on governing, planning, and financing your school's future, while leaving everyday decisions to competent administrators. To do that successfully, your Board must think, plan, and act strategically.

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See articles for School Heads, Business & Operations, Advancement, Academic Leadership, and Trustees, in addition to Private School News.

How Do You Find What Your Best Prospects Think About You?

Marketing Communications // May 6, 2022

For the school leader seeking to optimally position their school, and the marketing and enrollment management professionals who support them, there is no more important information than what is on the mind of their prime prospective families. Until recently, access to this knowledge was simply out of reach for most schools, since it involved engaging in large-scale market research with large associated costs. What’s changed? A new ability to utilize advanced demographic and lifestyle factor analysis, along with sophisticated analytics, to cost-effectively identify and conduct research among your school’s most valued prospects.

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Hiring? Here’s Why Applications Yield More Mission-Driven Employees

School Leadership // May 6, 2022

For school leaders engaged in the hiring process, the question of how to narrow the candidate field is a crucial one. With the flood of resumes that typically answer calls for faculty and staff, knowing how to effectively screen applicants and bring in qualified, mission-driven employees is a must. Moving from resumes to application-based hiring is one way to adjust the system and create an alternative hiring practice that maintains integrity.

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How to Understand and Enhance Anti-Racist Practices in Your School

School Leadership // April 22, 2022

Recently, schools all over the country have started to ask and address the same question: How can we best promote diversity, equity, inclusion, justice, and belonging (DEIJB) in our communities? Is there a presence of different identities, experiences, and perspectives? Have we developed a culture that enables people to see themselves reflected in the institution? Is there a system of accountability and repair for wrong-doing? Do students, staff, and parents feel valued and respected in ways that enable them to feel a sense of agency and trust in the school?

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Five Proven Strategies for Successful Auxiliary Programs

Business and Operations // April 22, 2022

Worries about rising tuition and changing demographics resulting in fewer potential students have led more independent schools to consider auxiliary programs as a viable way to boost revenue and admission efforts. Leading auxiliary programs are both visionary and entrepreneurial.

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Board Cultivation Is the Key to Long-Term Financial Stability

Fundraising // April 1, 2022

Your Board members and their involvement in your fundraising operation—as both donors and volunteers—are key to your program’s long-term stability. Your Trustees provide foundational support of your annual fund, your events, and your capital campaigns, not only while they serve but also as Board alu...

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Lunch and Recess Time Crunch: How Does This Impact Your Students?

School Health and Wellness // April 1, 2022

School lunch is critical to student health and well-being and learning readiness. Lunchtime bolsters students with the nutrition they need to get through the day and learn to the best of their abilities. But most children are not given enough time to eat their lunch at school. As an independent s...

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