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Support from the Folio Community

by Meredith Monk Ford
Folio Executive Director 

It’s lonely at the top.

Even if you had an inkling six months ago that you’d still be wrestling with pandemic challenges in the Fall, it doesn’t make today any easier.

Leading faculty and staff at the start of a pandemic school year is much different than March’s emergency — but it comes with the same never-ending barrage of tough choices, gut instincts and being pulled in 12 different directions by 12 equally dire dilemmas.

Not only is it lonely at the top, but being alone isn’t even an option, because you CAN’T do it alone – and you shouldn’t.

You need the perspectives and ideas of other people and the opportunity to think clearly, talk things out, and get feedback. You need to know what works best — and why.

For that, there’s the Folio community — YOUR community of school leaders who are here to support you.

The issues you face and the tough decisions you need to make are critical — but perhaps not unique. There are other school leaders — other Folio members — who may have dealt with those challenges  or who can offer unbiased, experienced insight that will allow you to think better… or differently.

Folio brings our community  — YOUR community — together. Through webinars, presentations, forums, and cohorts, Folio members collaborate, share, and learn from each other. Sometimes, it’s simply just knowing that you are not alone — that there are others who have felt and overcome the same concerns.

Beginning in October, we will be hosting a robust schedule of professional learning opportunities around topics that Folio member schools have asked the Collaborative to bring them together to discuss. The first of these collaborations is our popular Mastermind Calls. Click here for more details.

You’ve read it here before — we are here for you. “We” is not just the Folio Team but your fellow members of the Collaborative. I encourage you to connect with us and with each other.

Another true adage is “there is strength in numbers;” I encourage you to use the strength of the Folio community.

About the author

Meredith Monk Ford

Executive Director of Folio Collaborative since 2013, Meredith Ford and her team partner with 100+ schools globally to help them foster a working environment of professional learning where teachers want to stay and thrive. Before joining Folio Collaborative, Meredith was a classroom teacher and coach. After graduating from the University of Maryland with a BA in Classics, she returned to her alma-mater, the Bryn Mawr School in Baltimore, to teach middle school ancient history and coach. While teaching at Bryn Mawr, she also completed her first master’s degree in Liberal Arts at Johns Hopkins University. In 2009, Meredith pursued a second master’s degree in School Leadership at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. The following fall, she joined the middle school faculty at McDonogh School where she served as a 7th grade history teacher, hockey and lacrosse coach, grade-level leader, and eventually, the Folio Administrator. As a result of her own Folio conversations with McDonogh administrators, she was able to realize one of her professional goals when she left the classroom to lead Folio Collaborative full-time. Because of her experience working in an environment where she thrived, Meredith is passionate about Folio’s potential to help other schools create that experience for all teachers. Although she is striving to spend the majority of her time working on the business, she still loves opportunities to train and facilitate workshops amongst administrators and faculty around professional growth, leadership, conversations, and feedback. She has spoken multiple times at the NAIS Annual Conference, the TABS Annual Conference, as well as many regional school association events. When she is not running the Folio Collaborative business, Meredith enjoys learning from her Entrepreneurs’ Organization Forum and spending quality time with her guys Owen (7), Walker (5), Briggs (2), and Robby (35).