Below are descriptions of APEX courses available during the coming year. Each course provides 12-16 hours of activity over a four-week period (1.5 CEUs). Summer courses are compressed into two weeks each. Purchasing books may be required.
Registration Deadline: January 27, 2023 | Orientation Meeting: February 3 (Zoom)
In the classical school, all elements of school life reflect the leader’s vision, including scheduling, recruitment, enrollment, budgeting, and facility management. This course takes current and prospective school leaders through a one-year cycle of operationalizing vision, including delegating strategically. You will engage with ancient and modern voices, such as Shakespeare, Donald Cowan, and Peter Drucker. You will also meet several successful headmasters in the Great Hearts network and read about their unique approaches to the operations of their respective schools at the time of the interviews. This course contains synchronous elements. Please be prepared to attend one group meeting a week.
Registration Deadline: March 17, 2023 | 10 spots only.
This course takes participants through specific “on the ground” challenges encountered by real headmasters in their own journeys to start a school. This course also provides distinct opportunities to reflect on the meaning of education in varying communities. This course contains synchronous elements. Please be prepared to attend one group meeting a week.
More information coming soon.
This course will take participants through an exploration of several dyads crucial to a healthy parent community on a school campus: parent to parent; teacher to parent; and leader to parent. In each case, the school leader can use both group and individual dynamics to sustain a healthy community. The course will also include material on conflict resolution and on public speaking. This course contains synchronous elements. Please be prepared to attend one group meeting a week.
This course will highlight one of the critical building blocks of a virtuous faculty culture – hiring for mission fit. In a school with a focus on virtue ethics, the teachers serve as models to the students, as a type of character friend who will always carry the best interests and moral growth of the students firmly in their hearts. Beginning with a section on identifying “first who,” the course will then explore several components in the process of hiring for mission fit, including recruiting, screening, interviewing, and onboarding. This course contains synchronous elements. Please be prepared to attend one group meeting a week.
This course requires a campus mentor who is a part of the campus hiring team.
A recommended entry point into the APEX program, this course uses the classical virtues as a paradigm for developing a healthy faculty. The objective of this course is to develop your understanding of the components of a healthy faculty culture so that you can bring that understanding to bear on the practical, day-to-day decision-making processes of a school teacher. This course contains synchronous elements.
Another recommended entry point into the APEX program, this course uses the classical virtues as a paradigm for cultivating a healthy student body in partnership with teachers. The objective of this course is to develop your ability to integrate a consideration of virtue, and an orientation toward virtue, into the practical, day-to-day decision-making processes of a school teacher. This course contains synchronous elements.
This course uses the Great Hearts Teacher Excellence Playbook as well as other tools to reflect on defining quality teaching in a classical school. In addition, participants will review frameworks for classroom observation and feedback, professional development workshops, and supporting a system of academic interventions.
This course focuses on leading from the heart and flourishing amidst the slings and arrows of life as a school leader by aligning classical virtues with modern management practices.
For more information, please contact Great Hearts Professional Development at pd@greatheartsamerica.org.