In the 2010-11 school year, the landscape for independent and faith-based schools is both promising and daunting. It’s promising because we’re out of the woods of the most severe economic crisis of our time, but remains daunting because many schools are still wrestling with the most important issues that have come to encroach upon their long-term sustainability: tuition and fees, class size/scalability, tuition dependency, adding but not eliminating programs, teacher salaries, unsustainable increases in financial aid, and building a 21st century school. Ironically, almost every single one of these issues has been discussed at national gatherings for the past ten years, but the conversation seems “stuck.” What do we need to do to actually effect change?
The National Business Officers Association (NBOA), an organization that serves independent schools, recently convened a conference called The Institute for Advanced Financial Management, with financial support from FACTS Management, to confront these issues through a “think-tank” approach. FACTS and NBOA would like to share the results of this conference with school leaders to help them bring about change that will lead to a promising future for their school.