From Board to Students, Everyone Helps Manage Risks at Ravenscroft School

For Ravenscroft School, creating a robust, communitywide risk management system meant starting at the top. That’s the approach Leonard Johnson, assistant head of school for business and finance, adopted about five years ago when he decided to assess how well the Raleigh, N.C., independent school was handling institutional risk management (IRM). With 1,200 students, 240 faculty and staff, 125 acres, and a 155-year history—along with athletics, bus transportation, global education, and summer programs—Ravenscroft has a lot to protect.

“We were doing a lot of things right to mitigate risk on this campus, but we weren’t as formalized as we should have been in all areas,” Johnson said. “There was no annual reporting on risks.” Instead, the emphasis was on buying insurance and having adequate coverage rather than assessing and mitigating potential risks. Also missing was a culture in which everyone, from the trustees and head of school to students and parents, was aware of and involved in IRM.

Using United Educators’ (UE) Best Practices Checkup for K-12 Schools, Johnson set out to assess Ravenscroft’s IRM strengths and weaknesses. He focused on administration, crisis management, employment, student affairs, and facilities and public safety. After his research, he drafted Ravenscroft’s first institutional risk management plan and a business continuity plan.

Johnson's first point of contact for the new plans was the board of trustees. That was a shift in perspective for Ravenscroft; the business and security officers typically had primary risk management responsibility. Now, under Ravenscroft’s constantly evolving IRM process, the appropriate people across campus monitor and respond to potential risks, Johnson said. The Ravenscroft board steps in and exercises its fiduciary and oversight functions at that point.

Ravenscroft's board committees are the foundation for its IRM program, with each holding an area of responsibility. Each committee oversees specific tasks, and its chair works with a staff liaison with expertise in that area. Together, they identify risks, devise solutions, and create implementation plans. Johnson’s goal is to set up a system in which at least two committees report each year to the board’s audit committee, which has assumed oversight of the risk management process. This will spread IRM responsibility across departments and constituencies. 

The layers of responsibility will extend to Ravenscroft’s students as well. “They will be educated on our plans to keep them safe and their role of being the eyes and ears on things that might create risk and ways to avoid risk,” Johnson said.

“Implementing the IRM system has increased awareness of risk management,” Johnson said. Some of that heightened attention comes from the enhanced training the school has launched in response to its risk assessments, including harassment prevention. 

In addition, Ravenscroft also stepped up its student wellness programs, adding an assistant head of student affairs who oversees mental and physical health initiatives that are incorporated into every grade’s curriculum. Examples include drug and alcohol education and character development programs.

Taking IRM Abroad

The IRM process has also led administrators to take a closer look at Ravenscroft’s global education program. The director of global education and initiatives now works with a company that manages international security issues as well as medical emergencies and evacuations. Administrators make sure everyone involved in a trip—from faculty leaders to parents—knows all requirements and expectations. “We bring together all faculty who will be sponsoring global travel and review our policies and procedures, best practices, and our relationship with our international travel company,” Johnson said.

A trip leader told Johnson that the increased communication gave her a new perspective about keeping parents informed, saying, “I didn’t realize before how important it was to be intentional. Don’t assume that parents know everything.”

For schools starting their own IRM efforts, Johnson has some advice. “Don’t try to do everything at once. Select two or three top priorities and start with them. Create a chart so that you can see the size and scope of IRM so things don’t get left behind.” Most importantly, he said, schools need “a wide range of involvement. Board involvement is critical, but IRM is so huge it cannot live in just one office. It doesn’t matter how big or small a school is.”

Even though Johnson adopted a “start-at-the-top” approach, “that doesn’t mean we have a top-down program," he said. "My vision is that when all the processes are in place and working properly, there are no cases where someone says, ‘I thought someone else was doing that.’” 

By Donna Davis, a freelance education writer