We’re incredibly grateful for you and your team for ushering us gently and thoughtfully through the branding and messaging process and creating a website that helped us raise $2 million more this year than last year.
Season of Sharing Fund
By shifting perceptions from elite tradition to inclusive leadership, Severn School’s new strategic plan and brand empower every student to lead with agility, integrity, and purpose.
Sector
Nonprofits
Deliverables
Brand Strategy
Visual Identity
Website Design
Visual Identity
Website Design
A ‘traditional’ school, a changing field.
Challenge
Severn School, renowned for its emphasis on character, conduct, and scholarship as a school that prepared young men for the Naval Academy, faced enduring perceptions of being “traditional” and “elite.” These misconceptions posed challenges in showcasing the now co-educational K-12 school’s inclusivity and the diverse facets of leadership it valued. To enhance its program, culture, and reputation, Severn sought a strategic vision and plan.
Leadership is agility, not bravado.
Insight
Recognizing the inherent equity in Severn’s history and values, Mission Minded identified a need for reframing the narrative around leadership. We proposed shifting from conventional ideas of power and strength to emphasizing intellectual agility, unwavering integrity, and instinctive inclusivity as hallmarks of effective leadership. This insight transformed leadership into an accessible quality for all, aligning seamlessly with Severn School’s mission of nurturing exceptional individuals.
Kevin Swanson
Executive Director
, Season of Sharing Fund
Grounded in equity and integrity.
Journey
Collaborating with Mission Minded, Severn School built a strategic plan that carried its Naval Academy-rooted values of character and conduct forward into a broader, more inclusive definition of leadership. The plan guided Severn to innovate its programs, expand professional development for faculty, and upgrade the facilities where students now practice the kind of agile, principled leadership the school has always valued—just for a far wider range of students than it once did.
Century-old school, reading as a leader.
Impact
The plan reshaped how Severn defines and teaches leadership, and the brand that grew out of it gave the school a clearer, more current way to communicate its century-old values to students, faculty, and the wider community. A school once known mainly for preparing young men for the Naval Academy now teaches a far broader range of students to lead with the same agility, integrity, and inclusivity, carrying its original values into a future its founders couldn’t have pictured.
