The Student Information System (SIS) serves as a school’s database of enrolled students, their attendance, class schedules, parents and emergency contacts, and often much, much more. The SIS is like a school’s brain – critical to its ongoing functioning – and so adopting or switching to a new one is no small decision. Although needs vary between schools, some basic considerations apply across the board. This post aims to familiarize you with some of the main questions to ask yourself (and prospective vendors) before making a decision.
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As many school administrators and staff already know, approximately 90% of funding received by schools is driven by enrollment. Student recruitment can drive enrollment, and thus has a significant impact on the financial stability of your school.
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Operating with a low supply of cash reserves can be an extremely stressful situation for any business. This can be a particularly daunting challenge for public charter and independent schools as cash inflows do not always align well with required cash outflows.
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Attracting and retaining high-quality employees is critical to school success. One of the ways school leadership can show its staff, both new and returning, that they are valued is by offering benefits that they truly value.
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Building on our data experience with schools, we have compiled best practices for managing the communication and wider dissemination of state test results across critical internal stakeholders.
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Attendance and absenteeism are continuous educational challenges. However, before schools can effectively address absenteeism and improve their attendance rate, it is critical to understand common factors that can impact the students they serve.
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As more and more data is made available to educators, data dashboards are increasingly hailed as one-stop, silver bullet solutions to school problems. Despite investing money and staff time into data visualization software and dashboard development, end-users (principals, instructional coaches, and teachers) often don’t find the information useful. We believe that dashboards are not a solution on their own. It’s the analysis and communication of the data that makes it useful to educators and directs their time, passion and attention.
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All too often school leaders go through the process of making a budget – only to let it collect dust once it’s complete. A budget done well transforms abstract goals into concrete numbers and allows you to track progress towards those goals throughout the year. If you are not coming back to your budget on a regular basis as the year progresses, you can stray from your goals and expose your school to unintended risks.
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We have found in our work around the country that schools struggle to implement their succession plans even after they are created. Too often a succession plan sits untouched until a leadership transition occurs, and the organization stumbles because team members have not been trained on the challenges of roles outside of their own.
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Every year, our schools ask us questions like, “How are other schools spending their student recruitment dollars?,” and “How much are other schools spending on student transportation?” While school leaders know what they have spent in the past and plan to spend in the future, they often don’t have helpful information about their peers. Additional student expense categories are covered in this post.
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