Board of Trustees & Governance | New Garden Friends School

How our Community is Governed

New Garden Friends School is an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation. The NGFS Board of Trustees exists to create plans, set policies, and make decisions that will ensure the vitality of the institutional mission for our current and future generations of students.

Core Responsibilities of the NGFS Board of Trustees

1. Strategic Leadership and Planning

The board adopts the school’s mission and strategic goals and establishes policies and plans that reinforce them. The board ensures that the school’s mission is appropriate, relevant, and vital to the community it serves. The board monitors the success of the school in meeting its mission. The board undertakes formal strategic planning on a periodic basis, sets annual goals related to the plan, and monitors progress of the plan.

As a Quaker school, the board intentionally nurtures the Quaker dimension of the school and respects and promotes the practice of Friends processes and testimonies.

2. Head of School Partnership

The board selects, supports, nurtures, evaluates, and sets appropriate compensation for the Head of School. The board works in tandem with the head of school and the administrative leadership team, being careful to focus its primary work on long-range and strategic issues, not the daily operations of the school. The head of school is the board’s only employee.

3. Fiduciary Oversight

The board accepts accountability for both the financial stability and financial future of the school, overseeing operating budgets, engaging in strategic financial planning, and preserving capital assets and endowments. The board ensures that the school and the board operate in compliance with applicable laws and regulations.

4. Resource Development

The board participates actively in all facets of advancement and fundraising (fundraising, advocacy, ambassadorship). Trustees are active ambassadors for the school. The board supports the school’s advancement team.

5. Board Development

The board concerns itself with its own development and function. The board reviews and maintains appropriate bylaws that conform to legal requirements, including fiduciary duties of loyalty, obedience, and care. The board identifies, recruits, orients, and educates trustees. The board follows principles of good governance for boards and trustees. The board performs regular self-assessments.

2025-26 Board of Trustees

Tony Allen
Tracy Avant
Sarah Bruce
Kim Costello
Gina Howard
Chelle Jeffery
Katherine Pappa
Nick Purrington - Clerk
Meredeth Summers
Susan Wooster

As a former NGFS student and current parent, serving the school as a board member is a privilege and a responsibility. I couldn’t turn down the opportunity to guide the school forward in ways that keep a Friends education possible in our community after my own experience at NGFS shaped so much of who I am today. Contributing to the sustainability and success of the school is the least I can do in return for the impact it has made in my own life.
-Chelle Jeffery, Alumna and Alumni Parent

Why is it a privilege to serve on the Board of NGFS? New Garden was here for us as a family at a crucial transition for our daughter, and I want to be a part of ensuring that it will be here for another family who needs it to thrive here in Greensboro for their child (children).
-Paula Katz, Alumni parent

Our world is constantly changing and change is so difficult because it takes us into the unknown. While we can’t stop it or slow it down, at NGFS we teach our children self-confidence so they can embrace the unknown. Our students become a community of learners where everyone’s voice matters, and our Quaker values prepare them to be comfortable and thrive in a diverse world.
-Neil Belenky, Friend of the School

My service to the NGFS Board of Trustees allows me to remain connected to a place where my children developed a lifelong love of learning, formed friendships that are like family, and became thoughtful, caring individuals.
-Susan Wooster, Alumni Parent