2026 Small Schools Summit

Small schools don’t have the luxury of inefficiency. Every program choice, every hire, every enrollment decision reverberates across the whole institution. The margin for error is thinner, but the opportunity for clarity is greater.

Serving as a senior leader or trustee of a small independent school is deeply rewarding – and undeniably demanding. This work, best done in strong partnership between board and leadership, has become more complex in an increasingly dynamic landscape, with the headwinds of growing budget deficits, declining enrollment, compounding operational expenses, and rising expectations from families.

In this engaging and practical keynote, Sadie Albertyn of Mission & Data invites participants into a shared understanding of what true sustainability requires. Drawing on Mission & Data’s national work with independent schools from coast to coast and from big to small, this session explores how schools move from viability to stability and ultimately toward long-term financial and organizational sustainability. Along the way, we’ll examine the core concepts, key indicators, common pitfalls, and data-informed strategies that help leaders align enrollment, staffing, program design, and financial modeling into a resilient institutional engine.

Grounded in both theory and real-world practice, this session pairs clear frameworks with practical examples tailored to the unique pressures facing small schools, equipping leaders with the language, perspective, and tools needed to make disciplined, mission-aligned decisions for the long term.