New Year, Better Board

Happy New Year!

Now is the perfect time to energize your board with some new year's resolutions. Here, we supply two to get you started. Read on for:

Resolution 1: Three Governance Basics
Resolution 2: Go the Extra Mile with Engagement
How Pasek Consulting Supports Boards

Resolve to...Execute These Three Board Basics for Effective Governance

We frequently discuss the habits of effective boards with boards and authorizers. A charter school’s longevity is closely dependent on the quality of its board. When boards approach us for help, we often begin our work by reviewing the basics. These are the indispensable activities that will be considered when the authorizer reviews the school’s performance.

1. Oversight of the School Leader

How effective is your annual school leader evaluation process?

2. Oversight of the Charter Agreement

Does your monthly board dashboard give you the school’s most important vital signs?

3. Oversight of Finances

Is your finance committee productive?

Resolve to...Go the Extra Mile with High Quality Engagement

Boards that annually meet the basics should take their engagement to the next level by getting to know their school community. Some boards may claim they don’t want to over-engage and blur the governance/management line. Don’t worry; most are still far from that line, so feel free to get engaged a little more.

Here are some examples of great engagement we have seen recently:

Hold an annual family forum. At this event, the board first shares its vision for the near and far term, then engages families in meaningful conversations about the present and future.

Meet the faculty. Host a mixer, round table, or open house with faculty, so faculty members and the board can put faces to names.

Tour the school. Have the school leader show the entire board around the school, visiting classrooms, observing transitions and even meeting some students. It will bring some life and context to your board meeting’s monthly dashboard tool.

Pasek Consulting’s Support for Boards

We continue to expand our services to meet the needs of boards.

In addition to academic achievement outcomes, governance strength remains a top area of authorizer interest during the renewal submission and visit process. Boards that show they’ve been truly engaged throughout the charter term are faring best during the renewal process. That requires activities in every year, not just the renewal year. To support boards in this work, we have recently added services in our annual package designed to support board capacity, like annual retreats, renewal audits in non-renewal years, board surveys, and more.

As always, please shoot us an email if you have any questions or if you have a board challenge you'd like to discuss.

Best wishes for a productive new year!

Nora, Jen, & Dan