Kalix Marketing often asks its trusted partners to serve as guest bloggers to share their expertise on subjects critical to independent school marketing and communications. We are honored to have Myra McGovern, founder and principal of The Polaris Collaborative and past NAIS communications administrator for two decades, offer her sage wisdom on an often-misunderstood and overlooked area of school messaging: crisis communications.
It can feel like you’ll always be THAT independent school, the place where something horrible happened. You may be flooded with grief or pain for the people most affected by the crisis. It may feel like life at the school will never return to normal, that you’ll have to spend the rest of your career dealing with the crisis.
While you might know on a rational level that recovery is possible, it can be incredibly difficult to believe it when you’re in the thick of managing the response.
Whether you’re dealing with a case of historical sexual abuse, an accusation of discrimination, the death of a community member, or another complex situation, there is hope. A crisis is not a catastrophe. Your school (and you) will survive. You can even become stronger and better as a result of it.
Here are seven tips to help your crisis management team navigate any complex situation well.
Be a good human.
When a ship strikes an iceberg, the captain devotes all of his attention to keeping the ship afloat. This is a helpful strategy, since passengers are likely to die if the ship sinks. But a school is not a ship. The survival of community members is not dependent on the school’s physical structure, or even the school’s existence; a school is, first and foremost, a community of people. Caring for community members — and addressing human needs first — is critical to success in a crisis. Starting with students, write out what each constituent group needs, both physically and emotionally. Identify where the school is able to address the needs and where additional resources may be necessary.
Let your mission and values guide you.
A crisis situation includes an element of shock or surprise and a pressure to make decisions quickly. Often, leaders must make a series of choices where the answers and outcomes are not obvious or desirable. In situations like this, focus on making the most reasonable choice that aligns with your school’s mission and values.
People join independent school communities because they believe in the mission and values of the school. Referring to those foundational ideas often helps leaders make better choices and it helps others in the community make sense of the choices, even if they don’t necessarily agree with them. Leaning into your school’s mission and values also promotes psychological safety in the midst of a challenging situation.
It’s not what happened, it’s how you deal with it.
The stakes are typically high in a crisis, and often, the situation brings up strong emotions. The sense that you lack control over events in the world may cause a sort of decision paralysis.
One technique that can help is to focus on the future, rather than the past. Of course, the school must determine the facts of a situation, but once you understand the details, focus on what you can do to address it. Rather than dwelling on how difficult it is to mitigate the effects of the crisis, consider reframing the situation as an opportunity to demonstrate the positive traits of your community. Your ability to care for community members, to learn and grow as an institution and to develop solutions says far more about your school and your leadership than the initial crisis.
Get the right help.
When looking for consultants to help you manage the crisis situation, look for firms that understand independent schools and appreciate your unique mission and culture. Many law and PR firms do great work with Fortune 500 companies but struggle to work with schools.
As you bring in different experts to help the school, remember that you are hiring them to support you. The ideal relationship is one of partnership, where a consultant can offer their expert opinion, but the school leader must make the final call about what to do. If you don’t understand the rationale for the proposed strategy, ask questions. You may also want to run through different scenarios, gaming out possible outcomes to determine which approach fits within the school’s risk tolerance.
If you messed up, take responsibility.
Accountability is an important and sometimes challenging part of crisis management. Often, it’s difficult to determine exactly what occurred, or there may be conflicting pieces of evidence. Leaders may be reluctant to admit wrongdoing for fear that it will damage the reputation of the school or lead to expensive lawsuits. But research from medical institutions shows that taking responsibility for mistakes typically lowers the amount of settlement. This is because people who’ve been harmed are usually more focused on ensuring that no one else gets hurt than they are about seeking retribution.
The school’s actions can also have an impact on individual healing. Research with survivors of sexual abuse conducted by Dr. Jennifer Freyd found that an institution’s response to disclosures of abuse also affects the health of the survivor; at organizations that demonstrated institutional courage in handling abuse, survivors were less likely to experience severe symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
Put on your own oxygen mask.
In a crisis situation, leaders often feel like they need to work nonstop. Many people end up catching colds or coming down with other illnesses while dealing with crisis situations because their bodies get worn down from high levels of cortisol, poor nutrition and not enough sleep. Remember that a crisis situation is more often a marathon than a sprint, and you need to be in peak shape to lead and support your community. Just as you are advised during the safety demonstration on an airplane to secure your own oxygen mask before helping others, taking care of yourself will allow you to better serve your community.
Build learning and growth into the process.
A critical but often overlooked part of the crisis process is the post-crisis stage. In this phase, the crisis response team comes together to debrief, reviewing what went well and what could be improved. Consider whether any additional skills are needed on the crisis team. Did systems (i.e., access control, communications platforms) work well? Are there new policies or processes needed? Integrating key learnings into practice in formal ways such as written plans ensures that the whole school gets stronger from the experience.
A crisis situation may shake the foundations of your school community, but it doesn’t define it. With clarity, compassion, and a commitment to learning, you can lead through the storm and emerge stronger on the other side.
About Myra McGovern and The Polaris Collaborative:
The Polaris Collaborative was founded to help schools and nonprofit organizations manage crisis situations while staying true to their missions. Myra worked for the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS) for more than two decades before starting The Polaris Collaborative in 2025. Throughout her time at NAIS, Myra worked to help schools dealing with crisis situations. Most recently, she was the Vice President of External Relations for NAIS, where her team handled media and public relations, advocacy and public affairs communications, and executive communications. Prior, she served as the Vice President of Media for eight years, overseeing the team responsible for book publishing, a quarterly magazine, multiple content-rich websites, video content and social media.
