NBOA President and CEO
Many independent schools tout their small class size, as fewer students per teacher can mean more opportunity for students to participate and get individual attention. When it comes to data analysis, however, the opposite is true — the more participants involved in a single effort, the better the data that results and the more customized analysis can be.
With the closing of summer audits and the raising of Halloween decorations comes the time for school business leaders to report their financial operations data in DASL. NBOA’s data collection partnership with NAIS began in 2021, and the number of NBOA member schools participating has grown significantly. Last year, the number of participating schools topped 750, and this year, more than 1,000 NBOA member schools have started entering data in DASL. NBOA partnered with NAIS’s data collection efforts for a number of reasons, which were shared at the partnership’s inception:
- To eliminate duplicate data entry for schools and reduce survey fatigue.
- To increase accuracy by pooling resources to ensure clean data sets.
- To better populate reports and tools for both NBOA and NAIS.
- To increase opportunities for collective research and industry data analysis.
- To align the data used by heads of school, business officers and trustees to monitor financial performance to ensure fiscal health and future success.
I may be biased, but I would say that three and a half years later, we have succeeded on every front.
Why is your participation important? Not only does it provide your school with some of the best comparative data available to independent schools, but it also provides NBOA with a data set that we analyze on behalf of the entire independent school industry. Our research team identifies important variances and trends that we regularly report back to our members through reports, presentations and the Business Intelligence column in Net Assets magazine.
Schools need to activate DASL data entry by October 18 and compete DASL/BIIS Financial Operations data entry by Friday, November 22 to gain access to reporting in early 2025, once experienced scrubbers have cleaned the data. The majority of data points you enter into BIIS come directly from your school’s financial audited or draft financials, making participation a matter of a few dedicated hours rather than weeks.
Many a busy business leader has completed data entry to access NBOA’s tailored BIIS tools come the new calendar year. To those of you who have started, please remain diligent and finish the data entry by the designated window. If you haven’t participated before, know that monitoring and benchmarking tools like the NBOA Financial Sustainability Heat Map, NBOA Financial Dashboard and customizable peer cohorts will make your life easier – and your school healthier from a business standpoint. Consistent participation is key to these efforts; multiple years of data reveal the most telling trends that can inform you school’s strategic decision making.
When NBOA’s top notch research team has access to more data, they can draw more nuanced and accurate insights about what is happening at schools across the country, and often by region, to provide and what school leaders need to keep their eyes on.
Your school’s participation in DASL/BIIS Financial Operations data entry also fuels one-of-a-kind national research on independent school financial health, such as the “Financial State of the Industry,” which NBOA has released every year since 2020, as well as focused reports such as our recently released “Tuition Discounting Report for PK-12 Independent Schools.” When NBOA’s top notch research team has access to more data, they can draw more nuanced and accurate insights about what is happening at schools across the country, and often by region, to provide and what school leaders need to keep their eyes on.
Furthermore, DASL isn’t the only data collection opportunity for independent schools this fall. The Commonfund Institute is conducting its 20th annual survey of independent school endowments, collection for which opened this week. That’s right — NBOA is celebrating 20 years of partnership with Commonfund to provide this unique study to business leaders as they make decisions about asset allocation, spending policies and related matters. If you aren’t familiar with the Commonfund Study, it delves into timely topics, including total returns, asset allocation, fund flows, as well as investment management and governance. Look for an email from Qualtrics to participate and share your endowment data by December 6.
So, if you haven’t yet completed your school’s data entry efforts this year, get on your marks, get your data sets and get going! You and the entire independent school community will benefit from your school’s participation and put yourselves in a position to make data-informed decisions throughout 2025.
Follow NBOA President and CEO Jeff Shields on LinkedIn.
