After reading the case study below Identify and justify one long-term and one short-term plan for the future direction of FBPS. Provide specific, cited examples from the case study, and integrate outside sources to strengthen and support your claims of why these goals are needed. Make sure each paragraph in this section is at least 3 sentences.
The following case study is based on true events. Names and identifying details have been modified.
Freeman-Brown Private School (FBPS), based in Illinois, was founded in 1944 by the Brown and Freeman families. Over the years, the school acquired a reputation as a leading academic institution with an advanced curriculum. Parents described the school as having a highly performing academic environment that provided a rigorous curriculum while fostering a safe, family-oriented atmosphere in a place where community was valued. Not surprisingly, the student population grew and the school opened multiple campuses in the metropolitan area (Bristol, Culpeper, Richmond, Hampton, and Staunton). The Brown and Freeman families eventually sold FBPS to the for-profit, Alabama-based Caudhill International Family of Schools in 2007. The mission of the Caudhill group was to broaden the international focus of FBPS, along with the nine other schools it owned (across the United States, Switzerland, and Mexico). Even under the new ownership, the environment in the various FBPS campuses was still described as achievement-oriented and supportive.
Milestones
Within a year of Caudhill owning the school, parents noticed a subtle name change. The school, which was previously known as "Freeman-Brown Private School," was now "Freeman-Brown Preparatory School." This name change in itself did not seem to affect the school's image or functioning at an operational level, but it was an early indication of the strategic direction in which the school would be heading.
In 2008, FBPS attempted to enter the high school business at its Culpeper campus, but that initial attempt was not as successful as anticipated. This was probably a contributory factor to the relocation of the high school to a new state-of-the-art campus in Richmond, known as the North Richmond campus.
A high point for FBPS came in 2010 when it launched its International Baccalaureate Programme (IB Programme). Its first IB graduating class was May of 2012. However, that same year FBPS decided to close both the Culpeper and the Hampton campuses. At the time of the Hampton closure, families were informed that low enrollment was the reason behind the closure and that all other campuses would remain open. The economic recession in the United States between 2005 and 2011 led to many organizations going out of business, and the education sector was not exempt (U.S. Department of Labor, 2013).
In addition to the economic recession, private schools in Illinois have faced intense competition from charter schools, which are independently run public schools. Between 2011 and 2013, two top-rated charter schools opened campuses within 5 miles of the Staunton campus. Some FBPS Staunton campus students transferred to those schools.
In 2013, FBPS sent an e-mail to parents in error, informing them that the Staunton campus (pre-K through middle school) would be discontinued. That e-mail was withdrawn on the same day, and shortly afterwards, the head of the school retired. Caudhill appointed Dr. Audrina Murphy as the new head of the school. Dr. Murphy, a well-educated and experienced administrator, worked with "strategic planning experts" to create a niche and a new mission for the school. Dr. Murphy embraced her new role and continuously assured parents that the Staunton campus would remain open. Parents who attended the Parent Teacher Student Association (PTSA) meeting in mid-December 2013 affirmed that she offered assurances at the meeting.
January 2014
Winter break started on Monday, December 23, 2013, and students were scheduled to return to school on Tuesday, January 7, 2014. On Monday, January 6, 2014, the Staunton campus principal received information that the campus would close at the end of the semester, and this news was conveyed to faculty and staff at the school. Only two campuses would remain open: the Richmond and North Richmond campuses.
Parents were outraged, students were in disarray, and faculty and administration were in shock. If parents had been informed earlier, it would have been possible for them to try to secure a spot for their children at one of the schools nearby. However, open admissions at the surrounding schools had closed earlier in December. Parents attempted to place their children on waiting lists, but most lists had already filled up, some in excess of 800 students. Additionally, many local schools had already completed their hiring for the following academic year, leaving FBPS faculty and staff limited in employment options.
As it turned out, FBPS was not the only school closing campuses. That period was a difficult time for schools in Illinois in general, with reports from the Center for Education Reform (2011) reporting that between 2010 and 2011 the major reasons schools closure were financial, mismanagement, and district-related issues.
Parent Meeting
Parents were invited to a meeting on January 8, 2014, to meet with the head of the school and a Caudhill official. Parents invited the media to the meeting, but the media was denied access. At the onset of the meeting, Dr. Murphy took the podium and began by praising the Staunton campus and its community. These statements bothered some of the parents, who demanded to know why the school was closing if it had all the positive attributes just attributed to it.
The meeting grew tense and heated. Parents felt betrayed because of the timing of the closure announcement. Dr. Murphy stated that buses would be provided to shuttle children ages 2-12 to the new locations. However, the closest campus would require a trip of 40-miles (minimum) twice every day. This would not be a viable option for many parents, but the announcement timing left them with few options.
Other parents tried to negotiate with the administration to run the school for one more academic year so families would have enough time to transition their children. Neither the Caudill official nor Dr. Murphy agreed to this proposed solution.
Some parents offered to pay more in terms of tuition, but administration again did not agree to this proposal. Parents asked if the closure was due to financial reasons. Dr. Murphy replied that finances were "not a factor" and the closure was for "demographic reasons."
While Dr. Murphy stated that the reason for the closure of the two campuses was not financial in nature, Moody's analytics reported that the parent company (Caudill) was experiencing some strain. The rating of Moody's analytics is a representation of the analysts' opinion of the creditworthiness of an organization. From August 2012 to 2014, the corporate family rating (CFR) went from B2 to Caa2 indicating a lack of confidence in the financial health of Caudill.
Moving Forward
Following the parent meeting in January, some families pulled their children out of FBPS immediately, prior to the completion of the academic year. Those families received no financial reimbursement as parents had signed a contract for the academic year. Other families decided to withdraw from the school at the end of the semester. By June 2014, student population had significantly diminished on the affected campuses.
Some of the students who remained at Staunton planned to transfer to surrounding schools. Few decided to continue at the Richmond and North Richmond campuses. Others registered at Allegiant Academy, a new nonprofit private school opened by parents previously affiliated with Staunton. Kasey Luce, daughter of one of the FBPS founders, came out of retirement to become principal of Allegiant Academy. In addition to her role as principal of the school, Luce was also the president of the nonprofit corporation that owned the school.
Allegiant Academy began with an enrollment of about 100 students (pre-K-8 grade), rising to 120 students by the end of the year. Most of these students were from the Staunton campus population. The school leased a church for its first year to house the school. Parents described Allegiant Academy in positive terms with approximately 90% of families choosing to reenroll for the 2015-2016 academic year.
An open system is one, which interacts with the external environment in both ways as input, and output and a complex adaptive system is one, which consists of multiple micro systems that interact with one another to respond to the external environment and ensure its survival. An organization may act as an open system or a complex adaptive system during different times depending upon its environment. The given case of FBPS operating individually is more analogous to it acting as an open system. When FBPS was handed over to Caudhill school the whole system started operating as a complex adaptive system where both FBPS and Caudhill management were acting as individual units part of the overall system but representing one system while interacting with the environment. FBPS was probably not very effective as an open system at the time of its closure as it is clearly evident that is was not receptive to its stakeholders i.e. the children and the parents need and it was operating more like a closed system. It was neither effective as a complex adaptive system because its survival was at stake and seemingly the individuals units or components of the system were not working cohesively with each other in the overall interest of the survival of the entire entity. Hence it can be inferred from this case that the internal environment of an organization is a very important criteria for organization’s existence, survival and success in their pursuit of their goals. We can infer that the state of the organization’s climate would be a state of confusion and helplessness on how to adapt to the recession and still provide a differentiating scholastic environment to the children, which would drive growing enrolments. Usually recession is seen a good time to invest in capability building and in evaluating an organization’s shortcoming and preparing for the future. Whereas FBPS and Caudhill was not seen doing any of these things and their focus appeared to be short-term in reducing their cost of operations by closing down branches who were not growing in terms of enrolments or business or profitability. What was earlier perceived as a great institution eventually became a non-performing organization as is evident from the facts that when an organization is performing, it grows and expands its territories while on the other hand if it doesn’t perform to expectations, it scales down and cuts down its operations. The other aspect of organization culture could be a mismatch of cultures between FBPS and Caudhill management. This could have probably led to conflict in objectives, goals, mission and vision of the overall organization, which led to the decline in its performance over the years. We think that Dr. Murphy and Caudhill took a bad decision by not listening to their customers i.e. the children and the parents of those children. The founders do not build the institution, it is built by the people who are associated with that institution and therefore the leaders of the institution own the responsibility of taking care of the people and being sensitive to their needs, concerns and expectations. In this case, Dr. Murphy and Caudhill didn’t even bother to provide an alternative arrangement to the parents of the children enrolled in their school and left them in the lurch. The process of closure was an abrupt one, without giving any notice to the parents or children, not communicating the reasons for the closure, not giving them enough time for alternative action and also not providing an alternative or time extension in case some parents didn’t have any option. No, FBPS didn’t demonstrate social responsibility. The three stakeholders who were affected were Children, Parents and the Society as a whole. Children are future citizens of the society and any institution is a part of that society. That is the concept of social responsibility. Every organization or an institution needs to be socially responsible and sensitive to the norms of the society. The closure could have been managed more responsibly and differently by being transparent with the parents of the children and by giving them adequate time, atleast for their kids to complete the academic session so as to ensure a smooth transition to their new institution. Internal cultural differences could have been managed and arrested for sometime in the overall interest of the stakeholders. Although it is not very clear whether financial problems was a driving factor behind the closure, as Moody’s rating suggests, it could really be among one of the problems leading to the closure. The parents were even willing to pay more as academic fees so that they could have more time and extension to find an alternative institution for their children. However FBPS was not very receptive to the stakeholder need. FBPS could have sought specialist advice in the challenging scenario to address the issues it was facing at that time which could have helped them. The human relations approach could have worked wonders for the school in understanding the cultural issues and reframing the organization or restructuring itself for a better and effective management. It would have made sense to rethink a cultural makeover and the kind of organizational climate that was required to manage an institution like FBPS and Caudhill. Before the sell out to Caudhill, FBPS could have sought management advice if both the organizations could gel together and work as a single complex adaptive system or were they better more as separate open systems. One long-term goal for FBPS could be to Build and Nurture an institution for developing future citizens of the society. The short-term goal could be to improve on the current situation and control the adverse impact of its closure decisions with its stakeholders. Whatever damage was done, FBPS should have planned some initiatives for damage control and damage prevention for the future. Both the goals are justified because the long-term goal works on the purpose of FBPS whereas the short-term goal acts an enabler of the long-term goal. The planning, organizing, leading and controlling will be integrated around the stakeholder or the customer as customer is the purpose behind the creation of an organization, its life and its management. Each of these functions of management is important and together they must work in tandem for effective management.
After reading the case study below Identify and justify one long-term and one short-term plan for...