Inspired School Marketers Sparkcast

Patrick F. Bassett began his career in 1970 as a teacher, coach, and dorm parent at Woodberry Forest School (VA), followed by two headships—Stuart Hall in Virginia and Pomfret School in Connecticut. Pat served as the president of ISACS—the Independent Schools Association of the Central States—from 1993 – 2001, and then as president of NAIS from 2001 to 2013. After leaving NAIS he co-founded Heads Up Educational Consulting that provides strategic, operational, governance, and programmatic guidance and consultation to educational enterprises. Now, after 48 years in the independent school business, Pat recently announced his retirement from the industry. Rob talked with Pat about his career that spans 48 years and dedicated to private schools, his big takeaways about the industry then and now, and how schools can thrive in the future. 

Maria LaTour Kadison is president and CEO of EdwardsCo, an education marketing firm that has won more than 35 CASE and other industry awards for brand development, digital and multi-channel marketing, and enrollment and advancement communications. Maria tells InspirED the fascinating story of how she spearheaded Simmons College turnaround and how its success led her to help private schools enjoy enrollment and marketing successes of their own. Some of her clients include Phillips Exeter Academy, St. Paul’s School, St. Mark’s School, New Canaan Country School, St. John’s Episcopal School and Park School of Baltimore. Maria’s conversation with Rob will help you lay the foundation for your school’s marketing success in more ways than one. 

At InspirED, we believe the future for private schools lies in innovation to ensure they will not only survive but thrive. Create a program(s) that will be in high demand, that no one else is providing in your market, and do that exceedingly well. That’s what Philippa Fabbri did in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. In 2006, Philippa became the founder of Elsen Academy, an independent, non-profit school for students who have learning barriers such as dyslexia, ADHD, etc. as well as emotional and social barriers. The school has grown to enroll 125 students in grades 1-12. Learn about Philippa's journey, her success, and the benefits for her students.

InspirED knows of a number of private school marketing administrators who, in 2018, struck out on their own as independent consultants to other schools. Jill Goodman is one of them, and we thought it would be interesting to school marketers and others to learn about her decision and how she has developed her consulting business. For 9 years, Jill was Development Director and Marketing Coordinator at The GreenMount School, a K-8 coed day school with an enrollment of 120 in Baltimore, MD where, among other successes, she quadrupled the school’s annual giving. In 2018, Jill founded Jill Goodman Consulting, a firm that “specializes in fundraising, brand assessment, and strategic direction for young, small, or emerging non-profit organizations helping them to harness the combination of smart methodology, creativity, and compelling messaging that is essential to stand out from the competition.”In this episode of the Sparkcast, Jill talks about why and how she took the leap to consulting, how her experience as a sch

This is Part 1 of a two-part conversation. Heather Hoerle is Executive Director and CEO of the Enrollment Management Association (formerly SSATB) that serves 1,200 schools worldwide, primarily in the U.S. and Canada.Heather is a graduate of Westtown School, has sat on their board and currently sits on the boards of Princeton Academy, the National Business Officers Association and the New Jersey Association of Independent Schools. In this episode of the Sparkcast, Heather talks about enrollment management in 2018 and the critical role marketing has in admissions success. They discuss the value of tried and tool admissions tools such as viewbooks and school fairs and investigate what the new opportunities lie in the digital landscape.  

Heather Hoerle is Executive Director and CEO of the Enrollment Management Association (formerly SSATB) that serves 1,200 schools worldwide, primarily in the U.S. and Canada.Heather is a graduate of Westtown School, has sat on their board and currently sits on the boards of Princeton Academy, the National Business Officers Association and the New Jersey Association of Independent Schools. In this episode of the Sparkcast, Heather talks about enrollment management in 2018 and the critical role marketing has in admissions success. They discuss the value of tried and tool admissions tools such as viewbooks and school fairs and investigate what the new opportunities lie in the digital landscape. This is Part 1 of a two-part conversation.

 Americus Reed, II is The Whitney M. Young Jr. Professor of Marketing at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and co-founder and partner of identity, loyalty and branding consultants, Persona Partners. Americus is the Marketing Department’s only “identity theorist,” focusing his research on the role consumers’ self concepts play in guiding buying decisions. He examines how social identity, social influence, values, attitudes and judgments interact in shaping purchase decisions and consumer behavior, but from a social psychology point of view. Americus is a newly minted director of the Enrollment Management Association, which means he’s taking an accelerated, deep dive into independent school marketing as we speak. In this episode of the Sparkcast, I talk with Americus about identity loyalty theory, how it impacts private schools and how you can leverage it for meaningful , long-term connections to all of the school's constituents. 

Brendan Schneider is the Director of Advancement at Sewickley Academy, a PK-12 day school near Pittsburgh, PA. He is well-known for his website SchneiderB, where he is regarded as the go-to authority on private school inbound marketing and social media with thousands of followers who rely on his expertise.  Brendan also serves on the Board of Directors of the AISAP (Association of Independent School Admission Professionals), is an Inbound Marketing Certified Professional, a Hootsuite Certified Professional and a contributing blogger for edSocialMedia, AdmissionsQuest.com, and Social Media Today. For this podcast, Brendan and InspirED asked our community members for questions they would like to hear Brendan and I talk about. We got a great response and covered as many questions as we could in the time we had.  If you're still looking for answers, please reach out to us directly, ask your question in the comments below, or post your question on one of our Facebook pages. These are the questions we tackled and t

Greg Bamford is a educational thought-leader who consults on design thinking, leadership and strategic thinking. After working as a teacher at independent schools for over a decade, Greg co-founded Leadership+Design, a non-profit organization that works with school leaders across the country to support educational innovation. In 2014, Greg decided to focus his attention on one school and became the Head of School at Watershed School in Boulder, CO. Watershed School is a unique school of 100 students in grades 6-12 . (Greg and I will be talking about what makes Watershed unique during the podcast.) Over the last four years, Greg helped guide Watershed's astonishing 78% enrollment growth and successful, first-ever ACIS accreditation process. Greg’s career is once again taking a turn in June, 2018 as he becomes the Associate Head of School for Strategy & Innovation at the Charles Wright Academy, a coed, JK-12 independent school enrolling 665 students in Tacoma, Washington. My conversation with Greg covers a

Mia Major is the Content Marketing Manager for Finalsite, a leader in K-12 independent and international school website development. Finalsite serves more than 2,200 schools worldwide. Mia writes 3-4 blogs per week for the private school market on such diverse topics such as marketing and communications, education technology, and web design. In this episode of the Sparkcast, we talk to Mia about the newly released Finalsite The State of Social Media Marketing Among Schools. This report is the result of a survey Finalsite developed on how schools use social media, what channels they use, budgets, time allocation and much more.

Megan Cartier leads the most important and exciting initiative in the history of The Association of Boarding Schools (TABS)—the North American Boarding Initiative (NABI)—which aims to increase boarding enrollment by 10% over five years. Under Megan’s leadership, the TABS team will develop and share relevant market data, insights, tools, resources, and programs that can be utilized by participating schools in their own enrollment marketing. NABI has branded its initiative “Ready for More?” For show notes and more brilliant ideas and brain food for school MarCom, go to http://www.inspiredsm.com/podcasts/. While there, sign up for our newsletter to make your job easier.

Joy Gendusa is the Founder and CEO of PostcardMania, a marketing company specializing in lead generation for businesses of all sizes. With only a phone, a computer and postcard marketing, Joy has grown PostcardMania into an industry leader generating more than $49 million in annual revenue and employing more than 200 people in the Tampa Bay, FL area. In this episode of the Sparkcast, we discover, despite what so many people think, direct mail is far from dead. In fact, it's surprisingly effective with both Millennials and GenXers, the likely parents of most school-age children. For show notes and more brilliant ideas and brain food for school MarCom, go to http://www.inspiredsm.com/podcasts/. While there, sign up for our newsletter to make your job easier.

Risa Engel is Director of Communications at Stuart Country Day School, a PS-12 girls' independent private day school in Princeton, NJ and part of the Sacred Heart Network of Schools. Risa joined Stuart in the fall of 2010 with over 15 years of marketing communications experience in both non-profit organizations and corporate business. On April 8, 2017, Stuart hosted its first #LEADLIKEAGIRL: A Conference for Risk-Takers and Changemakers.  It was designed to showcase and inspire girls’ confidence, creativity, and leadership in STEM and entrepreneurship. The conference featured two notable speakers: Dr. Ellen Stofan, chief scientist at NASA and Debbie Sterling, founder and CEO of GoldieBlox.  $8,000 in cash prizes were awarded to young women in high school for outstanding performance in the Business Fair and STEM Talks. This event was a roaring success for Stuart and brought hundreds of new faces to the Stuart campus, extending and boosting the Stuart brand. For show notes and more brilliant ideas and brain foo

Peter Gow was not only was born into a family of educators, he grew up on a boarding school campus, The Gow School in South Wales, NY, a school founded by his grandfather. In his 40 years of working at independent schools Peter has accumulated knowledge and experience about a wide range of issues, and it’s his ability to connect these diverse subjects like curriculum, marketing, branding, admissions, school culture and classroom teaching that makes listening to him so fascinating. Peter Gow is executive director of the Independent Curriculum Group, written numerous books and is a fascinating guest for this episode of the Sparkcast. For show notes and more brilliant ideas and brain food for school MarCom, go to http://www.inspiredsm.com. While there, sign up for our newsletter. We make your job easier.

This podcast is Part 3 of a series entitled "Maximizing Your Relationship with a Professional Photographer."  Scroll down to learn about Part 1 and Part 2.  Michael Branscom is a Philadelphia-based photographer who specializes in independent school still photography and film. Michael and I have worked together for the benefit of schools for over a decade. The fact that he was a journalism major in college greatly contributes to his incredible photojournalistic style and ability to capture campus moments perfectly and unobtrusively. This podcast is Part 3 of a webinar series with Michael titled “Maximizing Your Relationship with a Professional Photographer.”  Our goal for this series is to help save your school time and money and to make your job easier. Part 1 and Part 2 are recorded webinars and are chock full of incredible images from numerous schools that illustrate our points and will inspire and wow you. We not only use Michael’s photos in the webinars, but also those of other fine academic photographers

Janice Crampton is Executive Director of AISAP, the Association of Independent School Admission Professionals, the primary resource and leading advocate for the community of independent school admission and enrollment management professionals. We are delighted to have Janice as our guest on the Sparkcast where she talks about the critical role these professionals have in the health and longevity of their schools and the skills and competencies that are needed to do their job effectively. To that end, Janice has led AISAP to create and implement the Certification for Admission and Enrollment Management Professionals (CAEP) as well as programs and services that continue to advance, educate, and advocate for the profession around the world. For show notes and more brilliant ideas and brain food for school MarCom, go to http://www.inspiredsm.com. While there, sign up for our newsletter. We make your job easier.  

With Baby Boomers set for retirement, where will the next generation of independent school leadership come from? Our guest for this episode is Earl Ball, Ed.D., a Senior Fellow and Co-Director of the School Leadership Program (SLP), a Masters degree program in the Graduate School of Education at the University of Pennsylvania, that brings together aspiring leaders from independent, public, and charter schools. Earl served as Head of the William Penn Charter School in Philadelphia for 31 years. During that time, he was served as President of the Country Day School Headmasters Association, President of the Pennsylvania Association of Independent Schools, President of the Headmasters Association, and as a board member of the National Association of Independent Schools. He has worked extensively with Quaker schools and is Senior Search Consultant for Carney Sandoe & Associates. For show notes and more brilliant ideas and brain food for school MarCom, go to http://www.inspiredsm.com. While there, sign up for o

With the face of the Director of Marketing and Communications changing so rapidly over the last decade, InspirED wanted to know what impact this has had on hiring for independent schools and where individuals for this position are coming from. We sit down with Jane Armstrong, Managing Partner of Independent Thinking, an executive search firm based in Boston that works exclusively with independent schools on senior administrator hires. We unearth the challenges and solutions leadership and professionals face with the position of the independent school Director of Marketing Communications. For show notes and more brilliant ideas and brain food for school MarCom, go to http://www.inspiredsm.com. While there, sign up for our newsletter. We make your job easier.  

According to the U.S. Department of Labor, 65% of today’s grade school kids will end up in a job that hasn’t been invented yet. Ed Glassman is Executive Director of Springside Chestnut Hill Academy's Sands Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership where they have developed a program that takes on this paradigm and “embodies a bold and innovative vision that challenges the constraints of traditional education, preparing students to change the world through an entrepreneurial mindset—a mindset of curiosity and courageous creativity.” The Sands Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership at SCH strives to develop students who will shape this uncertain future. In this episode of The Sparkcast, Ed talks about the program’s goals, its workings, and why it's unique among the many independent school K-12 programs that teach innovation and problem solving. Ed holds a masters degree from The University of Pennsylvania in Education Entrepreneurship and believes that the entrepreneurial mindset—one of resilience, resourcefulness,

Private school administrators often ask, "How can we get faculty to be active marketers for the school?" Mike Connor, president of Connor Associates, is our guest for this episode of the Sparkcast and explains how to get faculty to be not only willing but enthusiastic participants in marketing your school. Mike has spent nearly 30 years in public, charter, and independent K-12 schools and colleges. He has a 360° perspective that comes from holding a wide variety of positions including teacher, counselor, academic dean, admission director, development director, director of communications, director of advancement, and an education marketing and advancement consultant. For show notes and more brilliant ideas and brain food for school MarCom, go to http://www.inspiredsm.com/podcasts/. While there, sign up for our newsletter to make your job easier