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Chief Operating Officer

Employer
Ascend Public Charter Schools
Location
Brooklyn, New York
Salary
DOE

Overview

The Chief Operating Officer (COO) is responsible for all operational functions across Ascend's rapidly expanding network of high-achieving charter schools. The COO ensures that every school function—student recruitment and enrollment, school operations, meals, transportation, procurement, student information systems, compliance and reporting, safety, and new school openings—is performed with excellence, so that student learning can flourish everywhere. The COO is also responsible for developing and overseeing a state-of-the-art Human Resources function, serving over 750 employees. The COO is a key member of Ascend's seven-member leadership team.

Ascend Public Charter Schools

Ascend is a nonprofit network of K-12 public charter schools serving 5,500 students across fifteen schools in Central Brooklyn. Ascend's schools are reversing the achievement gap and offering a scalable and sustainable model for urban public schooling. In 2019-20, network revenues will be $118 million.

Ascend Public Charter Schools equip every student with the knowledge, confidence, and character to succeed in college and beyond. We are committed to operating truly public schools that enroll all students, fill every vacated seat through grade 9, and operate at current public spending levels. Our schools not only close, but reverse longstanding racial and economic achievement gaps.

Our mission is to lead our students on a great intellectual journey, providing them with an exceptional education and placing them firmly on the path to success in college and beyond.

We guide our students to think critically and independently and to enjoy education as an end in itself. We teach a rich and rigorous liberal arts curriculum that nurtures students' natural curiosity about the world. We foster a positive, non-punitive school culture where students feel connected, empowered, and safe to take academic risks. By offering a rich liberal arts education in a supportive environment, we animate children's natural sense of curiosity and prepare students to think on their own, thrive on their own, and engage the world as informed, responsible citizens.

Ascend is known for its distinctive organizational culture that is at once relentlessly focused on excellence and yet collaborative, supportive, and warm. School leaders and teachers work together to achieve a deeply shared mission, and are provided with the curricula, resources, coaching, professional development, recognition, and opportunities for professional advancement to succeed and grow.


Responsibilities

Reporting to the CEO, the COO is a central member of the leadership team, responsible for key operational functions that support Ascend Learning's mission. The COO directly manages a team of 11 with 6 direct reports, with dotted line reporting of 14 Directors of School Operations, in overseeing all operational functions including student recruitment and enrollment, school operations, meals, transportation, procurement, student information systems, compliance and reporting, safety, and school openings. The COO ensures the seamless execution of Ascend's operational functions and serves as a critical thought partner to the CEO and members of the leadership team.

This is an ideal opportunity for a dynamic and visionary leader with significant operational experience to drive the operational strategy and systems for a premier K-12 charter management organization.

Responsibilities include, but are not limited to:

  • Drive excellence across all operational functions including human resources, student recruitment and enrollment, school operations, meals, transportation, procurement, student information systems, compliance and reporting, safety, summer and school year institutes, and school openings
  • Lead the design and implementation of systems, processes, and services that support Ascend schools and programs in delivering best-in-class educational outcomes
  • Continue to refine and build a sustainable, scalable, cost-efficient operational infrastructure that supports Ascend's continued growth
  • In partnership with Ascend's leadership team, execute the network's expansion strategy, to lead the seamless launch of new school sites and to provide robust support to existing sites
  • Ensure operational strategies are translated into specific objectives and plans (with contingencies); integrate and align efforts across functions, locations; set realistic yet aggressive timeframes for achieving key objectives
  • Make recommendations for organizational structure to foster a healthy, unified culture among central office staff and school sites, ensuring all team members feel valued, supported and inspired
  • Incorporate a strong customer service orientation into all aspects of AL and school operations

Qualifications

  • Bachelor's degree with equivalent work experience required; MBA or Master's degree in a related field strongly preferred
  • Seven or more years of operational leadership experience, ideally with success overseeing many of the following functional areas: student recruitment and enrollment, school operations, meals, transportation, procurement, student information systems, compliance and reporting, safety, and school openings
  • A track record of leading teams in diverse functional areas while serving as a member of a leadership team
  • Experience scaling operations in a high growth, multi-site environment
  • Operations experience within a school based setting or high functioning social sector organization strongly preferred
  • Experience launching new sites strongly preferred
  • Exceptional systems and process orientation, with experience designing complex and scalable systems/processes from scratch and improving upon existing ones
  • Ability to define strategic issues clearly despite ambiguity, provide sound recommendations, and take all critical information into account when making timely, tough decisions
  • Record of achieving aggressive results, ability to establish meaningful metrics to support data driven decisions
  • Passion for the mission of Ascend Learning and public education
  • Commitment to the values of integrity, collaboration, humility, candor, and collegiality

Compensation and benefits

Salary and benefits will be competitive and commensurate with experience.

Diversity, equity, and inclusion at Ascend

Ascend and its schools are committed to building a diverse and inclusive community, both through our hiring practices and our focus on creating a culture and environment where diverse perspectives, ideas, and identities are valued and integrated into our way of working and educating students. Ascend staff represent a wide diversity of racial, socio-economic, gender, religious, and national identities—opening a window to the entire Ascend community on the richness of humanity. We welcome all applicants who share our mission and vision to join us in our deeply consequential work.



Apply Here: http://www.Click2apply.net/2tx5qxp8hxjpbs9y

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