what type of board memebers are needed to run a charter school

Building an Effective Charter Schoolhouse Board

For this CHARTER EDtalk, Michelle Lohner, Sr. Account Manager at Charter School Capital, was joined by BoardOnTrack'southward Managing director of Leadership & Governance Training, Mike Mizzoni to discuss tips on how to build an effective charter school board. Mike shares his expertise on why is it important to put together the "correct" board, what qualities you should look for when building an effective board, the ideal size of a board, and how long should people typically serve on your charter school board. Delight watch the video below and read the transcript for the complete story.

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TRANSCRIPT

Michelle Lohner: Cheers so much everyone for joining usa today. I'm Michelle Lohner, senior account managing director at Charter School Capital. Today we accept Mike Mizzoni, manager of leadership and governance training for Lath on Track.

Mike Mizzoni: Hey, there.

Lohner: Thank y'all then much, Mike, for existence here.

Mizzoni: Thanks for having me. Excited to exist hither.

Lohner: Yes, yes. We're all excited to hear some of those best tips and best practices that yous have to share. So get it started, why is it and so important to put together the right board?

Mizzoni: Corking question. The governing boards of charter schools have a really, really important job to do. We often talk well-nigh how the governing board in the school leadership squad, and then your CEO or your executive director, are really two sides of the same coin governing and leading this organisation. Ultimately they've got a really important job to exercise. This is really the board of directors of a multimillion dollar public enterprise.

And and then given that, and whenever we apply that phrase, nosotros normally meet heads nod because information technology really gives it the kind of gravitas that information technology deserves. We remind people that serving on a public charter schoolhouse board is a office-time job, and it'southward really important. And and then we encourage people to take it every bit a really serious position. And so making certain y'all take the right people on the lath in order to accomplish all of the things that a practiced charter school board needs to accomplish is primal.

This is really what we call shared governance. And the way that shared governance works best is when there's a schoolhouse leader and a paid ready of skillful staff members who are there to run the school twenty-four hours-to-twenty-four hour period. And then separately nosotros have a grouping of laypersons who are not expected to be educators day-to-day who are leading and providing management and oversight for the system. And then what we desire to see with that group of lay people is a diverse background from everything related to their professional and demographic background and expertise.

Lohner: So that's interesting. You were saying having a broad background. What qualities, though, are you looking for when y'all're trying to build that effective lath setting yourself upward for growth?

Mizzoni: Yep, so there'southward definitely no right reply. And what is important is one of the things that we are promoting is this notion of existence actually strategic when y'all're recruiting your board members. Going back to the notion that this is a multimillion dollar public enterprise. What we want, what we encourage people is that their grade should follow their part. And so the board that they're putting together should be specifically formed in such a way that it's designed to achieve the affair that the board has set out to do.

So just for example, let's say that if 1 of the things you lot were looking to practice this year was to aggrandize into a new location, and you lot wanted to buy or build a new schoolhouse. At that betoken, it might be really important to have somebody who has school financing experience, real manor transactions, school compages or facilities experience, specifically to assistance the board accomplish that task of edifice or buying a new edifice.

Similarly, if you were going to first a brand new fundraising, capital fundraising campaign, you lot want to brand sure y'all're recruiting people who have fundraising feel that they can bring to the lath.

Lohner: Makes sense.

Mizzoni: What we encourage people is non to have a board that's made upwards of entirely educators or former teachers. One of the common things we see equally people are assembling their board for the start time is that they want to go and rent and recruit everybody who's either been a teacher or worked for a schoolhouse. And that's peachy, and nosotros want to make certain that at that place's real depth in the educational experiences and noesis, but nosotros also want to make sure that yous've got someone with financial experience, someone who understands how school budgets operate, someone with legal feel. Over again, not to be the lawyer for the board, but to take somebody who can call back with a different mindset about policies and when information technology's important to bring in outside legal counsel.

We e'er await to have someone with HR experience, and then somebody who understands employee relations and how to build a human capital pipeline of teachers and staff and holding your [inaudible 00:04:00] accountable and doing an employee review. Having HR feel and an understanding of that function is critical.

Some other affair that people don't think of often when they're assembling their lath is having previous governance experience. And then having somebody who has either served on a school board before or a nonprofit board or charitable board, again, brings that perspective of how grouping processes piece of work and how serving on a board is like serving on whatsoever other squad where you want to make sure that you're working together for the mutual goals.

Lohner: So that's actually interesting. You've talked a lot most the different qualities that go into making up a good board. What would you say is the ideal size of a lath?

Mizzoni: Yeah, once again, actually once more, I will say is that in that location's non a specific right answer. So again, I recollect every board, it's important for them to say, practise we have the size lath that meets the needs of our arrangement today?

I of the things nosotros talk a lot about is how boards authorities for growth. And specifically when it comes to charter schools, we know that there'due south a need for more than seats to be opened up in lease school programs. And then whether information technology's past serving more grade levels or by expanding into different locations, well-nigh charter schools that we work with are on some growth trajectory, again, either adding students to their current schools or expanding to new schools.

And then as the system does that and evolves, what we find is that the piece of work of the board simply past necessity becomes more complex besides. So as the organization is older, it tends to be that you lot need to expand the size of your board to go on up with all of that work that needs to get done.

So as a full general rule, it'south very common for boards, specially when they're in their planning years, maybe they oasis't practical for their charter nevertheless or peradventure they just have recently practical for their lease, it'd be very common for them to take a board of anywhere from v to seven or nine board members.

My recommendation is that you exercise not get out and offset a governing lath with fewer than 7 people because that's commonly about the minimum size that we find where you have enough diverseness of stance and background, but yous're also able to take a manageable sized grouping that y'all're working with, and things similar quorum are unremarkably non a problem.

As the organization evolves and things like the need to have really robust committee work in betwixt your total board meetings, every bit that tends to happen, you need to recruit more people to serve on all of these committees and to aid pull the weight of actually a sustainable, well-run lease school board.

Then what I recommend is that one time y'all've got your anxiety under y'all, and you become a well oiled machine, you should strive to take anywhere from 11 to fifteen board members as office of your team. Again, it's of import that boards reverberate and say, "What do we demand right at present?" Because it's non always the right solution just to add lath members. And what we discover is that if boards don't have the right processes and structure in place, then once you lot become to 13, 15 lath members, you quickly hit the bespeak of diminishing returns, and having more than board members on your squad actually becomes more problematic than beneficial.

Lohner: I could see that. Most having as well many, too many cooks in the kitchen, right?

Mizzoni: Exactly. And nosotros see that a lot.

Lohner: Yep. Then in terms of you talked well-nigh sort of that best practice, v to seven as y'all're simply getting started, and it grows as the school grows. What would you lot say most board members, how long do they actually serve on a school board?

Mizzoni: Right. So what nosotros find is full general dominion is that nosotros recommend full terms on the board of about six years, and there are a couple of ways we do that. The way that the length of somebody's term on a board is determined is typically by the term limits in bylaws. So we encourage every lease school board to have term limits in their bylaws, their governing documents. Because to the point that we've been making that given the fact that these charter school organizations are run past a group of interested people with all of these different backgrounds, it'south of import that you lot're bringing in new life, new blood, new experiences to the lath and that the board doesn't become stale, or very frequently nosotros have what nosotros call founder fatigue. If the lath, if yous accept the same founding group of board members for 10 years, the board tends to go dried, and we desire to bring in that new life.

Then what we encourage people is to set term limits in their bylaws. What we typically recommend are either two yr terms that are renewable up to 3 time, so you could serve for a total of six years, or the inverse of that would exist to have 3 year terms that are renewable twice. And so over again, we don't recommend serving for longer than a six year period on a board. It's great after 6 years to get some separation from the board, maybe accept a couple of years off and always have the opportunity to come up back. Just nosotros recommended having some sort of structured term of six years at a most that way board members have an out, and they can elect to not renew their term.

And so too your colleagues on the lath have the pick to say, "Nosotros might need to now go in a different management. And if the board members we demand now serve a different purpose, we want to take the ability to cheers for your service and then attract a new board fellow member to the team."

Lohner: So Mike, you had mentioned that, you know, it's good to prepare terms for your board members, you know, somewhere around six years. But with that, how exercise y'all ensure that you take longevity for your lath when there's this turnover, you know, every six years or and then?

Mizzoni: Yep, it actually all comes downward to succession planning for your board members and existence actually strategic when it comes to your recruitment efforts as a board. And then what we would encourage people to do is on an annual footing, is to exist very methodical about having a chat about their recruitment needs and you desire them to take a conversation most what it is that the board needs to do in the next two, three, iv, five years in order to be successful. And then to recruit people specifically who meet those needs, as nosotros talked about the diverse skill sets and backgrounds and experiences that we want on the board. And this is the challenge that just about every lease schoolhouse board that we work with faces is keeping a continuous pipeline of people who are aligned with the mission and then serve one of those particular purposes.

And and so there are a lot of tips and strategies out there that boards can use to ameliorate their recruitment efforts that brand information technology so that it'south not but going out and finding people and begging people to serve on your board but such that they're actually applying and knocking down your door because they want to serve and continue and further the mission. So people are interested in finding more information on how to recruit actually strategically and effectively. I know that nosotros at BoardOnTrack and at Charter Schoolhouse Capital both have resources on just how to practise that. The one, the two tips actually that I'd leave yous with are …

Lohner: Delight.

Mizzoni: One is to consider having a written job description explaining what information technology ways to serve on your lath. That way when people are interested in potentially serving, there's a document that you can point them to for what the expectations of their office will be.

Lohner: Definitely.

Mizzoni: And then the other thing I would consider boards to do is to add, consider adding people to their board who are not full voting lath members but are volunteer committee members. And and so what we notice is that bringing somebody into the work of the board by request them to serve on a committee while not existence a full voting board member is a great way to get them ramped upwardly and interested in the work [crosstalk 00:02:09] and then that when yous're ready for a seat to open, you've got some people that you can look to who are, you know, familiar with the work and ready to become upwards to speed.

Lohner: That makes perfect sense. You lot know, they tin really just kind of get their anxiety wet, right, and get to feel what it'southward like to exist on a lath and and then yous know, hopefully y'all know, have be gear up to just step on board ane twenty-four hours and exist board president.

Mizzoni: That'southward exactly right. That's what we like to see.

Lohner: Those are some cracking all-time practices and like y'all said, you know, be sure to check out the website. Only give thanks y'all so much, Mike, for being with the states today.

Mizzoni: Give thanks you.

Lohner: Thank you everyone for tuning in to our Ed Talk and hope that you have a great afternoon.

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The Ultimate Guide to Charter School Board Governance

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Source: https://charterschoolcapital.com/blog/building-an-effective-charter-school-board/

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