Mission-Anchored Compensation Strategies for Boarding Schools

Independent schools are in the ultimate people business, with up to 80% of operating budgets devoted to salaries and benefits for faculty and staff. In a boarding environment, appropriately compensating the employees who deliver the school’s mission 24/7 is critically important to the school’s health and stability and must be balanced with a financially sustainable system. The misalignment of a school’s compensation system with its mission, challenges and priorities may have a devastating effect on your school’s ability to attract and retain employees. It may also hinder your school’s ability to meet its strategic and financial goals, and to adapt in an unpredictable world.

In this workshop, NBOA subject-matter experts will review a variety of compensation models in schools and provide an overview of the challenges and rewards associated with specific systems. Case studies from independent boarding schools that have innovated their compensation model will illuminate possibilities. All information provided will be tailored to the unique needs of boarding schools, including guidance on the considerations each school should make when exploring, developing and implementing a new compensation system.

Recommended Audience: Heads of School, Business Officers, Human Resources Professionals and Controllers

Learning Objective(s):

• Examine common compensation and benefits practices in schools and how they sometimes differ between boarding and day environments.
• Learn essential factors for consideration when developing a compensation system for schools.
• Learn about specific challenges and benefits associated with different compensation systems in a boarding school.
• Learn best practices for compensation system implementation.
• Identify a process for developing and implementing a new compensation system at a boarding school.

Pricing

Members: $320.00
Nonmembers: $450.00

Register

Credit Information

Instructors

Patrick Schuermann, Ed.D.

Chief Strategy and Impact Officer

Optima Independent

Nashville, TN

Patrick Schuermann is one of the nation’s leading experts in educator compensation. He currently serves as chief strategy and impact officer for Optima Independent, which develops immersive teaching and learning experiences for educators and students leveraging VR & spatial computing platforms. In previous roles at Vanderbilt University, Schuermann founded the Professional Leadership Institutes at the Peabody College for Education and Human Development, and he developed, and for 8 years directed, the Independent School Leadership Master’s Program there. In 2022, Schuermann served as the lead researcher for NBOA’s Mission-Anchored Compensation Strategies initiative, the most comprehensive assessment of compensation and benefits practices used in our independent school community to date.

 

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Amber Stockham, SPHR

Senior Director, Human Resources Programs

NBOA

Pittsfield, MA

With 20 years of human resources-related experience, Amber Stockham, SPHR, brings expertise in regulatory compliance, talent acquisition and management, organizational planning, and compensation and benefits design to her role as director, human resources programs at NBOA. Prior to joining NBOA in 2020, her career spanned a variety of industries, including social services, manufacturing and construction. She found a passion for education when she served as the director of human resources at Miss Hall’s School, an independent day/boarding school for girls in grades 9-12 in Massachusetts. In her current role, Stockham develops and delivers highly practical and engaging programs, products and services on topics ranging from difficult conversations and employee supervision to benefits administration. Stockham holds a master of business administration from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. 

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