Chief Operating Officer

Location

This is an onsite role, reporting to our Grove Avenue, Indianapolis, IN location daily.

About Us

Global Preparatory Academy (GPA), is a dual language school that connects students from diverse linguistic backgrounds and educates them together in a highly rigorous, engaging, and nurturing environment. Using both English and Spanish to instruct students in all core content areas, students develop high levels of bilingualism and biliteracy, as well as a deep value and understanding of other cultures. As citizens in a global world, students at GPA gain limitless access to other cultures through bilingualism and instruction, which emphasizes critical thinking using global perspectives and experiential learning. Opened in 2016 and serving over 700 students in grades Pre-K-8, GPA has 2 district schools within the network: our Elementary School with the “House of Malala” serving students in grades PreK-2 as well as our “House of Chavez” serving grades 3-5; and our middle school or “House of House of Mandela” serving grades 6-8.

About the Opportunity

Reporting to the Chief Executive Officer, the Chief Operating Officer will ensure that our organization achieves operational excellence in support of student learning and our overall mission. As the leader of teams that coordinate administrative and operational functions for GPA as well as its District Office, the COO is responsible for driving innovation, excellence, and efficiency across every operational function including technology, talent, student recruitment and enrollment, facilities management, school operations, food, transportation, data information systems and analysis, risk management, compliance and reporting, legal, and school safety. This is an ideal role for a seasoned leader who identifies as an exceptional manager, motivating leader, and an operational strategist and implementer, who has demonstrated breakthrough outcomes in a similarly mission-aligned organization or school settings.

What You’ll Do

As the Chief Operating Officer, you will serve as an ambassador, both internally and externally. As the network’s number two, your role will include leading the following, among other duties as assigned by the CEO:

Operational Visioning & Effectiveness

• Leads all aspects of the Operational Division and builds a strong and nimble team through recruitment; professional development; performance management; and motivational leadership
• Ensures the overall quality of operations performance and customer service by analyzing service performance and customer satisfaction data, setting continuous improvement goals, and actively managing towards their achievement.
• Leads the creation and management of standardized operating procedures for school-based operations and IT in order to maximize the economy of scale and avoid duplicative efforts.
• Identifies, develops, and implements operational systems improvements that will support highly efficient, effective, and equitable operational performance at GPA; both improving upon the current state of operations and preparing for future growth in size and complexity.
• Leads the development and implementation of the annual operations plan.
• Establishes short-and long-term operational financial goals, metrics, and policies, and regularly evaluates the organization's performance against goals.

Campus Operations

• Collaborate with Principals to create and manage adjustments to school-based master schedules; coordinate employee PTO and coverage responsibilities; and lead school-based implementation of arrival and dismissal procedures.
• Participate in regular student enrollment and attendance team meetings. Implement region-wide systems at school level for truancy and attendance initiatives.
• Develop and support the implementation of a school-based recruitment strategy as well as re-enrollment responsibilities.
• Support in coordinating logistics for newly enrolled students with Principals.
• Collaborate across the Operations team on meal service operations and cafeteria culture; implement transportation systems, including the dissemination of bus information and the implementation of systems for transportation changes.

Facilities

• Participate in regular facilities walkthroughs with the Operations team.
• Develops and organizes ongoing, long range, and preventive maintenance plans and programs for sites, buildings and equipment, including ground keeping, transportation, and custodial services in concert with IPS. Participates, as assigned, with demographic planning.
• Develop and execute plans for the school-based physical environment and lead school-based planning of classroom assignments, lockers, furniture, etc.
• Collaborate with Principals on long-term space planning to maximize facility utilization and shared-space agreements and schedule alignment.
• Negotiates contracts as appropriate; reviews billings and contract terms with contractors, vendors, etc.; confers with legal counsel.
• Responsible for all facilities management and planning, lease and licensing agreements, hazardous materials management, security systems, capital improvement, maintenance and repair service, and energy management.

Risk Management & Compliance

• Develop and maintain organizational policies and administrative guidelines to uphold compliance standards and organizational integrity.
• Maintain safety specialist certification.
• Lead school-based efforts and compliance with safety protocols and drills.
• Ensure compliance with front-office safety protocols.
• Collaborate with school leadership to deescalate family situations. Investigate and resolve Title IX incidents.
• Provide oversight of and create transparency around school compliance and reporting.
• Establish compliance systems for charter renewal processes while creating systems that ensure GPA adherence to federal, state, and local legal and regulatory requirements.
• Manage outside legal counsel/ affairs, insurance, and risk management strategies for GPA.

Data Systems & IT

• Establish a multi-year IT strategy that helps Global Prep upgrade technology and operating systems.
• Oversee GPA’s technology use, identifying, developing and implementing solutions to make organizational processes, communication, document storage and other functions more efficient.
• Build and maintain data infrastructure and reporting tools, dashboards and systems to support the network’s instructional goals and growth.
• Work closely with the Data and Testing Manager and the IT team to ensure secure, reliable, and integrated technology and data solutions that support learning, teaching and core business functions in alignment with Global Prep’s mission and priorities.
• Oversee the continuing build out of the student information system, PowerSchool.

Talent Strategy & Management

• Develop and implement a multi-year talent strategy that helps Global Prep achieve its priorities, meet its goals and accomplish its vision.
• Develop and deliver a strong employee value proposition that focuses on optimizing hiring, onboarding, compliance, performance management, career pathways and total rewards strategy, including compensation and benefits.
• Embrace and operationalize Global Prep’s commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion, helping to drive success of a multi-year plan to strengthen diversity, equity and inclusion at Global Prep Academy.
• Motivate and lead a high leadership team that attracts, recruits and retains required members of the executive team not currently in place; provides mentoring as a cornerstone to the management career development program.
• Serves as a coach and resource to team members, cultivating career development and leadership opportunities as appropriate.
• Fosters an environment of cohesiveness, collaboration and achievement and ensures staff accountability for excellence through clearly defined and measurable goals.
• Creates a climate that promotes respect for others and acceptance of alternative ideas and approaches, as well as the highest ethical standards and practices.

Who You Are

• You get it done every time and efficiently. You have a relentless desire to achieve exceptional outcomes on behalf of our students and do so by developing an operations vision that everyone in your school community can get behind. You set clear goals and achieve results in a collaborative way that moves hearts and minds. You love distilling activities into processes, you are thrilled overseeing efficiency gains in your systems, and you would much rather tinker with the internals of the engine than worry about the paint job of the car.
• You are a problem solver. You have a figure it out mentality and have demonstrated experience in running the engine of many successful schools. You’ve seen just about everything in a school-based setting and already have a tried-and-true action plan for most everything when it comes to operations.
• You have exceedingly high attention to detail. You check things in triplicate, there is nary a decimal out of place in your spreadsheets, and typos, unassigned tasks, or that one bottle out of place in the storefront display stand out to you like a giant red dot.
• You are the ultimate self-starter. You need to be able to coordinate and execute successful projects with little guidance. You’re also a pro at managing up, helping bring in the CEO and other members of the Executive Team when and where you need them with the greatest of ease.
• You lead with vulnerability and compassion. You consistently focus on identifying opportunities to learn and grow and understand managing through change requires a human-centered approach that balances action with active listening. You operate with an exceptional level of self-awareness, humility, and integrity in all interactions, personally and professionally.
• You are an experienced manager. You should be comfortable managing small teams and gaining buy-in from diverse groups. You’ll also need to be a master of delegation to keep our fast-paced work moving to the right parts of the school community.
• You are a strong, intentional relationship builder and collaborative teammate. ​You thrive on bringing different stakeholders together around a common goal. You seek to understand different contributors’ motivations and enjoy finding creative ways of meeting multiple objectives. You shape relationships with an ethos of reciprocity.
• You are values aligned. You deeply believe that all children can achieve regardless of background, have an equity and inclusion lens, and share in the GPA way.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree from an accredited college or university MBA or other advanced degree strongly preferred
• A minimum of 10 years of leadership experience and/or 15 years of professional experience, in school, district or network-based operations leadership, talent, human resources, IT, and/or technology, legal, and or school operations functions.
• Experience in the education sector and familiarity with the landscape and context of the community of students for which GPA serves strongly preferred

Why Work With Us

Together with families and our community, we create a joyful and academically challenging environment that prepares students with the skills and confidence to pursue the paths they choose so they can lead fulfilling lives and build a more just world. Working at GPA means that you will have:

• Health and wellness matter. Whether it be medical, vision, dental, disability or life insurance, or parental leave, we’ve got you covered and offer a bevy of benefits (FSA and HSA too) to ensure that you and your family are taken care of when it matters. Love to get your body moving? We also offer free fitness memberships to local gyms and fitness centers.
• Support to plan for your future. Non-instructional staff have the option to participate in a 403B program where GPA will not only match but double your 3% contribution.
• A community of learners. We are a community of learners who are dedicated to reflection and continual improvement. We are passionate about our content, committed to refining our practice, and incorporate curiosity and a love for learning in our classrooms, which is why we offer tuition reimbursement for education related degrees
• Opportunities for you to recharge. We know that leading mission driven work requires rest. We offer non-instructional staff members 10 days of paid time off, in addition to 11 paid holidays, and 5 weeks of paid school breaks (1 Fall; 1 Thanksgiving; 2 Winter, 1 Spring).
• A competitive compensation package. For this 12-month position, we’re offering between $120,000 - $130,000 with an additional $5000 relocation bonus for candidates who are not local/ within a commutable distance to our Indianapolis location.

Global Preparatory is an equal opportunity employer, we hire without consideration to race, religion, creed, color, national origin, age, gender, sexual orientation, marital status, veteran status or disability.