Business View Magazine | April/May 2022

131 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE VOLUME 9, ISSUE 4 the resources and tools necessary to tend to the wellbeing of all members of the school community. HAIS is also very proud of its annual Schools of the Future Conference, a weekend- long event that takes place in the Fall and features keynote speakers, on-demand sessions, breakout sessions, and workshops, as well as networking spaces with facilitated conversations. “When COVID hit, it was a major challenge because that professional development piece of what we do for our schools had to be put on hold, or be somehow reimagined,” Bossert admits. “This year, the conference is back in-person and we’re in our 14th iteration. The event started back in 2008 with about 10 or 12 schools, and it’s now co-sponsored by the Hawaii Department of Education and ourselves. We attract around 2,200 public and private school teachers for three days, every year. We have featured speakers and about 100 breakout sessions for teachers to share their best practices. It’s a major source of income for us. During COVID, we couldn’t do it the same. We had to figure it out online, which we’ve done for two years and been somewhat successful.” Bossert says the pandemic forced him to reflect on HAIS’ role as a gatherer within the ‘tribe’. He collected as much information as he could about COVID, both nationally as well as locally, and turned that research into a rich listserv resource for all their heads of school. “Since we couldn’t hold workshops, we created listservs for all the Business Officers, Admissions HAWA I I ASSOC I AT ION OF INDEPENDENT SCHOOLS