Services

There is a new team of experienced educators in the education consulting field.

Bringing together a mix of unique professional experience as school principals and business managers, the team from Schools Active Worldwide (SAWW), offers to education institutions a range of services unparalleled in the education space.

Our deep experience is drawn from leading schools, serving on School Boards, advising and assisting schools' architects and specialist school recruiters, and consulting to schools and pre-primary schools. This experience is drawn from school leadership over many years in the high fee paying independent sector, Catholic, Islamic and Montessori schools. Our SAWW consultants have worked with schools in every state of Australia, in the the Middle East, New Zealand, Sri Lanka, Timor Leste, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Japan, India and the United States. Our consulting work has ranged across whole school start ups; site evaluations; Strategic and Facilities Master Planning, Board, Faculty and senior management appraisals; advising and mediating tensions and disagreements; advice and support on recruitment of senior executive staff; Foundation and funds raising guidance and support; repositioning culture and whole school direction.

Our mission is to work with School Boards and/or senior management to resolve issues and to set and implement whole-school direction.

Speciality Services

Advice and support to schools with planning, compliance matters, design, construction and development.
Recruitment, mentoring and development of management and teaching staff in schools.
Organisation and Faculty auditing and restructuring.
Planning and compliance checks of overseas tours and exchanges programs.
Supply, support and resourcing of the Australian International Schools' Certificate ™ (AISC) to non English speaking schools – an English language curriculum embedded within a non English language curriculum. Currently (2018) out of production.
Advice to students, families and schools on pathways, programs and global education options.

Active School

SAWW is committed to assisting education institutions to achieve their mission and strategic goals. Effective leadership is a core factor in an institution's ability to do this.

The goal is effectiveness and you cannot know you have good leaders, good teachers, a good school unless you have good evaluation. Appraisal systems are essential if you want this knowledge. To know what you don't know you must also know what you do know.

The Active School process depends for its success on a school's clear strategic vision, mission and goals statement and the school board's commitment to integrity, transparency and improvement.

Active School – Principal Appraisal – sets out a thorough, clear review process of the principal, the CEO, a review of performance, potential and development needs.

Active School - A 21st Century View

The Principal's Appraisal

An Appraisal.

An appraisal is a process that must be constructive and supportive. The appraisal process must be conducted in a spirit of transparency, collegiality and trust.

An appraisal process for the principal must be connected to clear expectations that are established through performance criteria linked to organizational values and goals that are established by the school council.

An appraisal must direct the school council, the governing body and employer of the principal, to areas of potential improvement for the principal and the school and secondly, to areas that are done well and require commendation and possibly further encouragement and development. This process might also be connected to the school council's periodic review of the principal's terms and conditions of employment. It is common for Independent school principals to be employed under a fixed term contract, often of five years.

There are two processes to appraise school principals, one informal and continuous, the other formal, periodic and instructive.

The informal appraisal occurs through the council members making routine observations at:

occasions, activities and events of the school.
visits by the council members to the school.
conversation between council members and staff members, school parents and other school stakeholders at functions, church, local Shopping centres and the like.
the routine reports of the principal to the council.
To a large degree, the appraisal of the principal is an appraisal of the school. In this sense informal general comments about the school by stakeholders are also a reflection of the community attitude towards the principal.

Informal appraisal is continuous and tends to reveal trends and general issues, qualities of character, and point to general matters that are of potential importance to the school council. The real value of informal appraisal only occurs when considered in association with more formal appraisal approaches.

The informal appraisal of the principal should be factored into conversations between the principal and the chair of school council. It is unwise for issues that arise from this continuous process to surface in routine council meetings unless firstly having been the subject of a conversation with the chair and the principal.

The Formal Appraisal is generally a part of a written policy of the school council. It may be the primary delegated responsibility of a governance sub-committee that includes experienced members of the school council, one of whom could be the chair of school council. An agreed, routinely revisited and reviewed written policy and procedures document is the guide for this process. A timeline will be a component of this document. The formal process will take into consideration the principal's role statement and contract and the strategic vision and defined goals for the school. The principal's contract must contain reference to the appraisal process, its purpose, structure and frequency.

As an instructive exercise, this formal appraisal staged process has a clear 360 element to it.

The formal appraisal of the principal will have some clearly defined stages.

SUMMARY OF FORMAL APPRAISAL OF PRINCIPAL

This summary assumes a five year appointment period. The length of this employment period can lead to variation of the process.

YEARS 1-3 OF APPOINTMENT

Principal - Quarterly reports to school council meetings on agreed issues of strategic importance.

Principal - Annual report to a school council meeting presenting a review of the school's progress against the agreed strategic goals of the School.

Meeting of delegated sub-committee of school council to review the principal's annual performance and determine and recommend any annual end of year adjustment to the principal's package.

Chair meets with principal and discusses the outcome of this annual process.

YEAR 4 OF APPOINTMENT

Principal – Quarterly and annual reports as above

School council, either through the chair or the appropriate sub-committee engages the principal in a discussion about the five year performance appraisal to be conducted during the first six months of Year 5. An external adviser is identified and agreed to and that adviser is approached either by the principal or the chair.

YEAR 5 OF APPOINTMENT

Principal – Quarterly and annual reports as above

Five year performance review occurs during the first half of the year, oversight by the appropriate council sub-committee.

Five year Review Report from the external adviser and/or the council sub-committee is given to the school council and is an agenda item for discussion at a meeting of the school council.

The chair meets with the principal to discuss with the principal the content of the Five Year Review Report and to communicate the outcomes from the school council's deliberations.

A written report from the council to the principal, summarizing these outcomes.

YEAR 6 OF APPOINTMENT

Return visit to the school by the external adviser to assess and refine the appraisal process previously used in the school, to receive feedback from each of the council chair and the principal and to assist the principal as requested, with performance adjustments and other responses to the content items in the Five Year Review Report.

It may also be that the process results in feedback to the school council about recommended adjustments to the school's strategic plan and key performance indicators that are linked to the plan.

Formal Appraisal Stage 1

Quarterly Reports on Specific targeted School Priority Fields.

The school council and principal will have agreed on these fields and their component parts as the key performance indicators (KPIs) of school health. As such together they are significant measures of performance for the principal. It is essential that the school council assesses each indicator in a trend line and not as a stand-alone annual performance item. For instance, the school council must evaluate the HSC results for any particular calendar year only after looking at the value adding through secondary school for the particular cohort. The school council must also look at the comparison with previous HSC cohorts at the school.

Key performance fields might be:

Enrolments
Academic and co-curricular performance
Financials
School culture
Performance of support groups such as P&F and Foundation

Each three months at a school council meeting, some time (possibly one hour) could be given over to an in depth presentation of a report by the principal on this key indicator, followed by questions and feedback to the principal.

Formal Appraisal Stage 2

Annual Appraisal Report on School Performance Against Strategic Plan and Goals

The principal will present to a meeting of school council a review of the year against the school's strategic plan and agreed annual strategic goals. The best time for this meeting is towards the end of the annual appraisal calendar. This annual report will highlight features covered in the quarterly reports as well as any other features, issues and problems that the principal wants to address. The school council will give some priority to the year ahead and to the priorities for the principal's quarterly reports of the coming year.

Very early after the presentation and discussion of this Annual Appraisal Report, the school council sub- committee entrusted with the oversight of this appraisal process, must meet and discuss the year's performance of the principal. Shortly thereafter, the chair of council must meet with the principal to engage him/her in a discussion about his/her performance during the year and any agreed alteration to the compensation arrangements of his/her employment.

Formal Appraisal Stage 3

Five Year Review of Performance and Contract Arrangements

During the fourth year of the principal's employment, the school council or its sub-committee needs to engage the principal in a discussion about a wide ranging formal performance evaluation process to be conducted early in the principal's fifth year of his/her five year contract. This must be a 360 appraisal process and would benefit from the addition of an appropriate external adviser who is familiar with independent schools, the work of school principals and who can demonstrate familiarity with the appraisal process.

The content of this Stage 3 process will be determined through consultation between the school council and the principal and may be influenced by the contributions of the external adviser selected by the school council.

The clear emphasis in this stage must be on the performance of the principal against the strategic plan for the school, the goals for the school and those key performance indicators that have structured the quarterly and annual performance reviews. This process in the early months of the fifth year, might include responses from groups and individuals within the school community, by way of questionnaire response and interview.

This review will absorb at least a week of the school's time. It will involve attendance at routine school activities, feedback from a variety of sources such as members of council and the school executive staff, leaders in the school support groups and possibly from students' parents and the students' leadership team. This 360 degree feedback provides the most comprehensive input to an employee appraisal process. It must be inclusive and transparent and representative of all school stakeholders. The review will include the content of the principal's contract such as base salary, leave provisions, car allowance, and other package components, against current market standards. It will also consider altered requirements and expectations of the school council and the principal.

The sub-committee will supply a verbal report to be followed by a more detailed written report (contents largely supplied by the external adviser) to the full school council. The Chair and the external adviser will meet as soon as possible with the principal in order to provide follow up and to receive the outcomes from the process. A meeting of the school council will dedicate some meeting time with the principal to a discussion of the report contents and to evaluating the Stage 3 process.

As soon as possible, the council will provide written correspondence on the outcomes to the principal. The school council's internal policy arrangements then will determine the arrangements to be implemented to determine the principal's contract details for the next employment period.

Stage 3 should be completed by mid year.

Formal Appraisal Stage 4

360 follow up

Assuming the continuation of the principal's employment into a further employment period, the first year of the new employment period must include a return visit by the external adviser. This one day visit, possibly six months into the new school year will include as a minimum, one on one discussions with the chair of council and the principal. The key purpose is to follow up from stage 4 and to provide feedback to and receive feedback from the principal.

Active School is a protected process that has been through a substantial peer review process. It is expected that use by education institutions will occur only following appropriate consultations and approvals. SAWW is the registered owner of this process. SAWW gives oversight to and conducts appraisals in Australia and overseas of education leaders, academic and non academic faculties and sections, and education institutions.

Active School – A 21st century view

The Faculty Appraisal

The Faculty Appraisal is usually initiated by a Principal for one of the following reasons:

It forms part of a continuous process of renewal and quality maintenance by a Principal interested in enhancing a standard of excellence in a school
It is a response to raised concerns about quality of teaching and learning

The Active School Faculty Appraisal is conducted by an appraiser, sourced externally to the school who is familiar with the Active School framework and has an understanding of the Active School culture.

This Faculty Appraisal process has been used and refined and peer reviewed.

Stages

1. An initial discussion between the Principal and the appraiser about motivations, needs, time frame, scope of appraisal and costs The Principal then assumes the task of having a Scope of Appraisal document prepared and when this is completed has it forwarded to the Appraiser. Some further discussion of the contents of this document might be required.

Additional documentation such as students' performance reports – HSC, NAPLA etc, staff professional development registers, strategic plans, might be requested by the Appraiser in accordance with the expectations of the Scope of Appraisal document.

The Principal prepares the school for the approaching Appraisal process.

2. The Appraiser meets at the school with the Head of Faculty and with other senior members of staff pertinent to the Appraisal and discusses the process of the Appraisal based on the Scope of Appraisal document.

A tour of the school in particular the Faculty spaces and informal interactions with Faculty staff are usually advisable at this point.

3. The Appraiser attends at the school to conduct the Faculty Appraisal. Generally, one school week is required for this stage of the Appraisal subject to the size of the Faculty and the Scope of the Appraisal. Common practice is for the week to be occupied with interviews with Faculty members and students, attendance at staff meetings and informal interactions in the staff room(s). Generally, quantitative methods such as questionnaires are not used. It is recommended that the choice of week coincides with a week in which staff meetings are scheduled to occur.

The final meeting of the week for the Appraiser is with the Head of Faculty and with other senior staff members as recommended by the Principal. The Appraiser talks through the week's activities, briefly highlights what findings are useful to mention at this time and outlines what process will be followed going forward. Feedback is sought from the Head of Faculty.

4. A Written Report to the Principal addressing the content of the Scope document is prepared by the Appraiser. Commonly there is a month between completing stage 3 and submission of the Appraisal Report. The Report is a detailed document and includes findings and recommendations. The Report is submitted in hard copy (and soft copy option) and delivered to the Principal. This meeting with the Principal commonly requires a two-three hour dedicated time allocation subject to the Scope of the Appraisal.

At this meeting the Appraiser will request feedback from the Principal about the process that has been used. There will be discussion about the way forward for the school with the recommendations in the Report.