Connected Schools Series

Every school leader has asked themselves: "Am I the only one dealing with this?"

Connected Schools exists because the most valuable insights don't come from consultants or conference keynotes—they come from conversations with peers who've walked in your shoes. Our monthly series brings together experienced school leaders, administrators, and safety experts for authentic discussions about the operational challenges that keep you up at night: building safety cultures, managing emergencies, implementing new policies, and creating systems that actually work.

We created this series after hearing from dozens of education leaders who were hungry for real talk from real schools. No product demos, no sales pitches—just practical wisdom from professionals who understand that every decision you make impacts the safety and success of your students.

Webinar Overview

Every school runs the drills. Fewer talk honestly about what the drills reveal.

In the opening weeks of the year, independent schools across the country ran their first lockdown, fire, and reunification drills of the season. A good drill almost always surfaces something the checklist did not anticipate. A substitute who needed a quicker way to learn the procedure. A wing that took longer to confirm than expected. A count that needed a second pass. That is exactly what practice is for, and those details are usually the ones that matter most when something real happens.

Practicing with a new roster, new faculty, and new families brings its own set of unknowns, and the first drill of the year is often the first honest look at whether the plan on paper holds up in the building. In this session, a panel of independent school leaders walk through what actually happened when they practiced: what broke, what surprised them, and what they changed the following week. Bring your own findings. This is a conversation among peers, not a presentation.

What You'll Learn:

• Where the gaps showed up: The specific breakdowns panelists found in their first drills, from communication delays to accountability gaps
• Substitutes, new hires, and visitors: How schools handle the people on campus who were not there for the training
• Getting to an accurate count: What it actually takes to confirm every student is accounted for, and how long it took
• Debriefing that leads to change: How panelists capture findings and turn them into revisions rather than filed paperwork
• Building drill culture with faculty and families: Framing practice as improvement instead of performance review

Who Should Attend:

Heads of School, Directors of Safety and Security, Directors of Operations, Division Heads, and any administrator responsible for emergency preparedness or drill planning.

Can't make this session? Register anyway to receive the recording and key takeaways.