Binder for Your Whole Campus

For fifteen years, The Principal Center has had one promise: get you out of the office and into classrooms.

I've spent the last year building the other half of that promise.

It's called Binder, and your ILA membership now includes it — not just for you, but for every staff member on your campus.

Three places to start

Binder runs a school — students, attendance, grades and all. But you don't have to begin there, and three weeks into a school year, you shouldn't.

These are the three I'd put in front of you first, because your staff can use them tomorrow without a rollout.

Repertoire — you already know this one

The walkthrough and feedback tool you already use as an ILA member. The difference is that now your whole team can use it — your APs, your coaches, your department chairs — and your own practice comes with you. Your rosters, your entries, your snippets are there on the first day.

Know which teachers to visit today, and actually get there. Write feedback rich enough in evidence that it changes practice, instead of a drive-by compliment you composed in the parking lot.

Your personal copy in the members' site keeps working exactly as it does now. Forever. Whatever happens.

Hall Pass — the one that makes people sit up

Your teachers keep using paper passes. They photograph the slip. The log fills itself.

No student logins. No Chromebooks. No kiosks. No app for a kid whose device died in second period.

What you get is a live board of who is out of class right now — and a list of students who are in the building but not in any classroom. Most schools have no answer to that question at all, and the ones that bought a system for it bought one that assumes every kid has a charged laptop.

Resolve — the one that keeps you

Handle the incident the way you already handle it. The defensible record writes itself as you go, instead of costing you an hour after the buses leave.

Staff can see that a student needs care without seeing why.

Nothing to rip out

That's the whole point.

No migration. No data conversion. No IT meeting. No purchase order. No waiting until July.

Start with three tools your staff can use on top of whatever you're running now. The rest of the platform is there when you're ready for it — and for the Founder's Circle, it's there permanently.

You can start Monday without asking anyone's permission — which is the only reason any of this is possible in the first three weeks of school.

Two ways in

Binder's standard pricing is per-student. That's how it will be sold to every school that comes after this. The Founder's Circle is the one group that never moves to it — not "for the first year," not "at a preferred rate later." Ever, for as long as you keep your membership.

Already on the annual plan? Add a year — one more $999 term, and you're in permanently. You won't lose a day of what you've already paid for: I make sure your new term starts when your current one ends. If you renewed within the last 90 days, you're already in; I'll email you.

On the monthly plan? Switch to annual to claim your spot.

I set it up for you

This is the part I'd underline.

You are three weeks into a school year. You do not have an afternoon to configure a platform, and I'm not going to pretend otherwise.

So I do it. I create your campus, I set up your staff accounts, and I walk you through it on a call. Your Repertoire history comes across before you log in for the first time. You show up and look at a working system with your own school's name on it.

Questions I expect

Do I need my district's permission? Not for these three. Nobody has to stop using anything, and no district system has to change — your staff are just doing work they already do, in a better tool. Adopt more of Binder whenever it makes sense, on your timeline.

What does "permanent" actually mean? Binder is included with your ILA membership, for one campus, for as long as you maintain that membership continuously. If your membership lapses, the founder benefit is gone and rejoining happens at whatever pricing exists then. The benefit belongs to you rather than the building — if you move schools, it moves with you.

What if Binder gets bought, or you retire? The commitment binds whoever ends up running it, and you can export everything you have, always.

Is this finished software? It's in active daily development, and I'm telling you that on purpose. These three apps are built and working — the video on this page is the real product, not a mockup. Other modules are still being built, and the Founder's Circle includes all of them as they ship. If you'd rather wait for a finished product with a thousand customers, that's a completely reasonable thing to want, and this offer isn't for you.

Why is the window so short? Because I'm setting up every campus personally, and because an open-ended permanent commitment isn't something I can leave sitting on the table. September 11 is a real date. It won't move.