President Search

Dear Members of the SYA Community,

Since launching the search for the next President of SYA, the Search Committee, with the support of our executive search partners at Carney, Sandoe & Associates (CS&A), has gathered thoughtful and wide-ranging input from across our global community. In April, we conducted a community-wide survey to identify the qualities, priorities, and aspirations the community envisions for SYA’s next President. In addition, our partners at CS&A spent a day at the Home Office in North Andover to talk with Tom, staff members, and Resident Directors (via Zoom), further deepening our understanding of the day-to-day experience and perspectives across SYA. We also listened carefully to areas where SYA can grow stronger, for opportunities to evolve while staying true to our mission, and for what our community hopes for in its next leader. The passion, honesty and deep commitment shown by so many of you have been inspiring.

In all, we received feedback from over 200 members of the SYA community, including alumni, faculty, staff and member schools. We are grateful to all who shared their insights, reflections, and hopes for SYA’s future leadership.

Your input has played a critical role in shaping the Presidential Position Profile, which outlines the priorities, challenges, and opportunities ahead — and describes the qualities we seek in our next President. This profile will guide our outreach and recruitment efforts as we now move into the candidate identification phase of the search. Carney, Sandoe & Associates are actively identifying and engaging prospective candidates. If you know someone whom you believe would be a compelling and inspiring leader for SYA, we encourage you to share their name (confidentially) with the search team.

We are excited to enter this next phase and are committed to finding a leader who will honor SYA’s extraordinary legacy while guiding the organization into a strong and forward-looking future. We look forward to updating you as the Carney Sandoe team completes their recruitment and interviewing stage. Thank you for your continued support and commitment.

If you have any thoughts or questions at any point in the process, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us at presidentsearch@sya.org.

Warmly,
Anne Morrissey ES’85 FR’25P
Chair, President Search Committee
 

Dear SYA Community,

As you know from a previous communication, SYA President Tom Hassan will be concluding his distinguished career in education and a decade of leadership of SYA in June 2026. While there will be opportunities over the next 15 months to celebrate Tom’s incredible leadership, the purpose of this letter is to outline the process we will undertake to identify our next President of SYA.

The Board of Trustees is committed to finding an extraordinary leader who, like Tom, embraces SYA’s mission and will lead us through the opportunities and challenges ahead. To aid that effort, the Board has appointed a Search Committee comprised of trustee members who are current heads of school, alums, and parents of current and former students. This group brings a deep understanding of SYA and represents a broad range of perspectives and voices.

SEARCH COMMITTEE MEMBERS

Anne Morrissey ES’85 FR’25P, Chair of the President Search

Julian Fu CN’06

Brittany Toscano Gore IT’02

Holland Goss Lynch FR’86, Chair of the Board

Julianne Puente, Head of School, Albuquerque Academy

Taylor Ruggles ES’85, Chair-Elect of the Board

Anne Stavney, Head of School, The Blake School, Vice-Chair

Steve Werber FR’83 ES’24P, Treasurer

SEARCH FIRM: CARNEY SANDOE & ASSOCIATES

After a rigorous selection process in which we evaluated several search firms, the Board of Trustees hired Carney Sandoe & Associates, a well-known search firm for faculty and leaders at schools, including many of our Member Schools. We are pleased to be working with Todd Bland, Beth Dietz, and Willy MacMullen as our lead consultants. They bring a nuanced understanding of international education, independent school governance, and leadership transitions. Todd was Head of School of SYA Member school Milton Academy, and Willy led SYA’s 2024-2025 reaccreditation review with the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC). Their insights will be invaluable as we undertake this important work together.

NEXT STEPS: COMMUNITY INPUT & BUILDING JOB DESCRIPTION

Building the President’s job description and identifying the qualities most important for this role will include many within the SYA Community. To this end, we have developed a SYA President Search Community Questionnaire which will be open through April 11. Your perspectives will be vital in shaping the leadership profile for the next President and helping us ensure this search reflects the spirit and vision of SYA. Please complete the survey at your earliest convenience and before April 11. The consultants will also meet individually with the SYA leadership team and Resident Directors in early April to solicit their input. Following those meetings, they will be connecting with faculty and staff at each campus. 

WHERE TO FIND INFORMATION

As the process unfolds, we are committed to transparency, inclusion, and thoughtful communication. We have added a President Search page to the SYA website and will provide communications as key events in the search take place. Additionally, we have a dedicated email address, presidentsearch@sya.org, for any inquiries related to the search. The Community Questionnaire will remain open until April 11.

We are excited about the future of SYA and grateful for your continued support. Together, we will identify a leader who honors SYA’s mission of cultivating global understanding, empathy, and independence through immersive international education.

Warm regards,

Anne Morrissey ES’85 FR’25P
Chair, President Search

Dear SYA Family,

Today I write to you with mixed emotions to share that the 2025–2026 academic year will be my last as School Year Abroad’s (SYA) President. Next year will mark my tenth overseeing this vibrant and life-changing program. It has been life-changing for me as well, and it is time, both professionally and personally, to hand SYA over to a new leader.

Back in 2015 when I was retiring as Principal of Phillips Exeter Academy, then chair of the SYA Board of Trustees, Ken Krushel ES’68, approached me about this leadership opportunity. Given Exeter’s status as one of SYA’s founding schools, I knew a great many students and colleagues whose lives had been positively impacted by immersion in a different culture and language through SYA. As a working-class high school and college student, it was not something I had ever envisioned experiencing for myself. This was finally my opportunity to do so. Throughout the past decade SYA has provided me with a most rewarding job and a unique window on the world that I could never have imagined. 

In my earliest SYA years, we launched significant curriculum reform. We offered enhanced opportunities for students to expand their learning environment by using the local areas as classrooms. We also asked students to employ their increasing language skills on capstone projects of their choosing. Together with a highly engaged leadership team and trustee group, we were able to define a bold strategic plan and raise the funding to support its recommendations. Chief among them were calls to increase the student financial aid pool and grow our endowment. Leadership is not without its difficulties, and in my case, the COVID-19 pandemic posed many challenges. We evacuated students, continued with online learning and restarted SYA after a year’s closure.

Running SYA takes an incredible group of dedicated individuals, and I have been blessed with so many over the years in all positions: the Resident Directors who work endlessly and so effectively for their students and colleagues; the teams at each campus whose love and support for students is evident every day; the trustees who guide us with vision and skill and set the highest bar of collaboration; my cherished colleagues in the Home Office who work tirelessly with dedication and good humor. I will miss them all dearly.

Today, SYA is in an extraordinary position, as the group of outside evaluators from the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC) recently affirmed in their reaccreditation report. I know, however, that great schools need fresh leadership to continue their evolution and ongoing excellence. Therefore, The SYA Board of Trustees will organize and execute a thorough search for my successor during the next 17 months.

Personally, after almost 50 years working with high school students, it is time for me to think about other pursuits, including spending more time enjoying the work of my wife, Maggie, on Capitol Hill and continuing the care of my son, Ben. 

I will remain fully engaged with SYA until June 30, 2026, continuing to help provide this unique and immersive experience for high school students and facilitating a smooth leadership transition to my successor. This great institution will surely continue to grow and evolve, and I have been honored and privileged to have played a part in our 60-year history.

Sincerely,

Tom Hassan
President, SYA

Dear SYA Community,

With deep gratitude and appreciation for Tom Hassan’s exceptional leadership of School Year Abroad (SYA), the Board of Trustees has accepted his decision to step down as President at the end of the 2025–2026 school year. 

We will miss Tom’s profound reserves of experience and wisdom, his clear-eyed and continuous dedication to SYA’s mission and his deep and unceasing care for everyone in the SYA community. Tom’s tenure has been characterized by his mission-driven leadership, his grace under pressure and his commitment to excellence at all levels of SYA. He is leaving the school at a time of financial and reputational strength and with an understanding that a fresh perspective will be able to take SYA confidently into its next chapter. Consistent with his thoughtful character, Tom’s notification of his plans well in advance allows the board ample time to conduct a full and thorough international search for SYA’s next President.

Tom will be a very hard act to follow. He has overseen many of the school’s greatest advances in its 60-year history, and he has shepherded SYA through some of its most challenging years. Shortly after Tom’s 2016 arrival at SYA, he oversaw the execution of a highly ambitious strategic plan. The plan included developing and implementing an innovative place-based and experiential curriculum, welcoming semester students and sophomores to the program and improving all aspects of the student experience. He increased opportunities for faculty professional development and reinforced networks of support and collaboration between SYA’s campuses. He strengthened many important partnerships, especially those with SYA’s valued Member Schools. 

To support these innovations and many others, Tom engaged tirelessly in gentle and persuasive fundraising efforts, helped us surpass The Campaign for SYA goal and completed the school’s most ambitious capital campaign to date. Through his prudent stewardship of SYA’s finances, the school’s endowment tripled under his tenure, tuition increases slowed and funding for student financial assistance grew substantially. 

These would all be outstanding accomplishments under any circumstances, but they are especially commendable given the disruptions of the COVID-19 pandemic. Early in 2020, he oversaw the evacuation of students from four overseas campuses and their shift to online learning for the remainder of the year. Using innovative and creative strategies, he then carried the organization through a full academic year of closure. It is a testament to his extraordinary governance that SYA returned immediately to robust enrollment and regained all financial losses within two years.

For the next 17 months, we will have the benefit of Tom’s continued leadership and many opportunities to celebrate him. The Board of Trustees will now begin its search for SYA’s next President, and I am confident we will have many well-qualified candidates thanks to Tom’s legacy. We will keep the community updated throughout the search process. For now, please join the board in thanking and congratulating Tom for his decade of exceptional service to School Year Abroad.

Sincerely,

Holland Goss Lynch FR’86
Chair, Board of Trustees