Head of School Retreat 2022

Dr. Erica Brown

Resilience can only be built when everyone within a school can manage failure, mistake-making, and rejection and repurpose them as tools of human development. Using a meld of biblical and rabbinic texts, leadership literature, and case studies from you and your colleagues, we will examine how we think about and talk about our own leadership mistakes and regrets, and how we use what we learn from our mistakes to grow individually, with our teams, and for our students and community.

Dr. Eli Gottlieb

A useful working definition of culture is “how we do things around here.” Sometimes, culture is expressed verbally, but mostly it is made up of nonverbal practices and attitudes. Together, we’ll explore these silent aspects of school culture and the roles you play in shaping them. Using experiential protocols and your own case studies, we’ll examine tensions at the boundaries between home, school and student cultures, and how thoughtful use of “the unspoken” can help manage these tensions.

Nishant Mehta

“Why do you want to lead? And why would anyone want to be led by you?” Go on a reflective journey to explore the personal and professional core values and beliefs that drive your strategy and decisions as head of school. Digging deep into your leadership style and impact, you will also be introduced to, and work with, tactical and strategic facilitation tools and resources that build alignment and foster psychological safety and intentionality with your team.

Sandra Nagy

Hone in on the skills that the world’s top leaders use to empower cultures of high-performing collaborative teams. Take the next steps towards making the aspirations and vision you have for your school a reality by engaging in meaningful, scaffolded learning and ideation personally and with peers. Walk away with a toolkit of practical ideas to leverage with your school team to drive system, structural and protocol changes.

Affective Goals

• Feel connected to the community of Jewish day school and yeshiva heads
• Feel that your own professional needs are supported
• Feel nourished, inspired, and valued for your work as a head of school

Behavioral Goals

• Take time for yourself as a professional, and experience meaningful pause
• Connect, learn, ideate, and iterate with colleagues from across the field
• Be appreciated - from the Jewish community as a whole, from Prizmah, from your colleagues, and from your school community

Cognitive Goals

• Experience high-level learning with compelling and creative faculty, oriented towards emergent needs from the field
• Examine how you lead the creation and maintenance of your school’s culture - and how school culture expresses itself throughout your school community
• Discover new ideas and approaches with your peers

Prizmah prioritizes the health and safety of our community. We continue to closely monitor CDC, local health authority, and Prizmah medical advisory team guidance for gatherings and will follow those guidelines. Final protocols and guidelines will be shared with participants in January 2022.

Head of School Retreat participants, presenters, and Prizmah staff are required to be fully vaccinated against Covid-19. In addition, we require booster shots for all participants who are eligible to receive one. Full vaccination is defined as having received two doses of vaccines with a 2-dose protocol or one dose of vaccines with a 1-dose protocol. Fourteen days must have elapsed following the administration of the final vaccine dose. All participants will be asked to submit proof of vaccination during the registration process. If you are not yet fully vaccinated, proof must be submitted by Sunday, January 23, 2022.

Investor Summit and Head of School Retreat participants, presenters, and Prizmah staff will be required to take a PCR test in advance of the gathering. We will share clear and detailed testing instructions and timelines in advance of the gathering. Prizmah has contracted with Inspire Diagnostics to provide US residents with an easy-to-use at home self test kit - the cost of this test will be billed to your health insurance. Since Inspire Diagnostics is based in the US, we ask that Canadian participants arrange for your own PCR tests before leaving home. Inspire Diagnostics will be available on-site at the Summit and Retreat to facilitate required testing for your return to Canada.

Meals will be served outdoors, under the cover of a tent. Some sides of the tent will be kept open to enjoy the sea-breeze ventilation.

W Fort Lauderdale has implemented a multi-pronged approach to meet the health and safety requirements of Marriott’s “Commitment to Clean” standards. Program space ventilation has been upgraded according to CDC standards.

Masks will be required indoors at all times, but will not be required for outdoor meals or programs. We will continue to review other safety factors as needed. Decisions will be made in consultation with Prizmah’s medical advisors and current guidance from health authorities. Final protocols and guidelines will be confirmed in mid-January.

If you feel sick, we ask that you stay home. If you develop any signs of illness while at the Summit or Retreat, you will be asked to isolate yourself from other Summit / Retreat participants.

If you have questions about our Covid safety protocols, please reach out to Daniel Infeld at danieli@prizmah.org or 646-975-2834.

Our time together will begin at 1:30 PM on Monday, February 7, (lunch will be available at 12:00 PM ET) and will end at 12:00 PM on Wednesday, February 9. Please plan on participating in the entire program.

Heads of school from Jewish day schools and yeshivas across North America will gather for the Head of School Retreat. On Monday afternoon and evening, heads will also have the opportunity to collaborate and learn with day school philanthropists, board members, and community leaders who are participating in the Day School Investor Summit. A participant directory will be available to registered participants in the program app.

Your registration fee includes lunch and dinner on Monday; breakfast, lunch, and dinner on Tuesday; and breakfast and lunch-to-go on Wednesday along with snacks and beverages throughout the retreat.

Meals and snacks will be catered by Magic Fisch Hospitality + JM Hospitality Group and will be strictly kosher under the supervision of the OU. All meat will be glatt. Cholov Yisroel and Pas Yisroel (dairy and bread with additional supervision) products will be available upon request.

We make every effort to meet your dietary needs. All meals will include vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free choices. Prizmah cannot guarantee the absence of gluten or allergens from any food; however, we are happy to connect you to our catering staff on-site who will be glad to help you find nourishing choices.

At Prizmah, we strive to create spaces for a wide variety of practices and work hard to create warm and spirited davening experiences. There will be daily Shaharit, Minhah, and Ma’ariv services with options to meet your needs.