Committee News

Executive Committee

Board President - Carl Grobien

Board Vice President - Rodrigo Lobo

Treasurer - Juan Morales

Secretary - Patricia Garza

Financial Investment Committee

Committee Chair / Treasurer – Juan Morales

Committee Members - Eugenio Garza, Jorge Cardenas, Michael Adams, Carl Grobien, Michael Adams, Luis Carlos Reyes

Goals of the Committee

  • Ensures congruence between the monthly financial reports and the budget.
  • Analyzes and proposes to the board the yearly operational budget and the capital projects.
  • Guarantees endowment fund compliance according with the ASFM investment policy statement.

During school year 18 – 19 the implementation of a corporate restructure was approved and is now underway to better protect the school assets. An improved School’s endowment investment policy was approved to optimize the portfolio’s risk adjusted return. This will allow to increase expected returns while the volatility decreases. A comprehensive cost analysis was put in place to improve budgeting and spending. This was done through the formal programming of monthly meetings with cost center owners and the Superintendent. In these reunions budget variations are being reviewed to find areas of opportunity to increase value and/or savings from expenditures. Also, the Board’s financial information package was revamped so it is now more explicit, graphic and with a deeper revenue and expense analysis. A Zero-Based Budget project was approved. This will help us obtain still more value from our expenses.

The Capex and Opex budgets were formulated and approved by the board much earlier than in the past giving more time for their analysis. The projected operational revenue for school year 2018 – 19 will be slightly under budget. Total expenses are projected to be better than budget due to a depreciation adjustment. Total cash flow available for investments is projected to be lower than budgeted. This is mainly due to a drastic increase in electricity costs and a negative exchange rate fluctuation. The school’s endowment fund for the four quarters before March 31st has grown according to the endowment policy benchmarks obtaining above inflationary returns. The Capital Expenditures budget approved was 25,144,393 plus $9,294,335 collected from the Edge of Excellence Campaign.

Governance and Nominations Committee

Committee Chair: Paty Garza

Committee Members: Alfonso Garza, Dionisio Garza, Michael Adams, Carl Grobien

Goals of the Committee:

  • Recommends to the board policies and processes designed to provide for effective and efficient governance.
  • Reviews and recommends a position description detailing responsibilities of and expectations for board members and the board officers.
  • Recommends nominees for election and reelection to the board.
  • Nominates board officers for election by the full board.
  • Advises management on plans for board development, including new member orientation and training of board members.
  • Ensures the board’s self-assessment and improvement process every year.

The Governance and Nominations Committee met on multiple occasions during the past school year to carry out its responsibilities. During the last School Calendar year, the Committee carried out their annual Board member self-evaluation system and overall board evaluation process to ensure effective school governance.

Auditing Committee

Committee Chair - Miguel Bichara

Committee Members - Rodrigo Lobo, Raul Rhon, Gustavo Romo, Jaime Martinez, Carl Grobien, Michael Adams, Luis Carlos Reyes

  • Goals of the Committee
  • Ensures the existence of the legal, ethical, governance and regulatory requirements compliance.
  • Monitors and ensures adherence to the internal audit plan.
  • Reviews and discusses observations coming from the internal audit reports.
  • Evaluate when risk approach on the audited processes need to become deeper and proposes recommendations as necessary in order for management to analyze.
  • Review and update the actual admin. processes. Instructs the administration to give training to the owner of the process and audit its implementation.
  • Reviews and reports to the board the annual external auditing of the financial statements by KPMG.
  • Reviews and reports to the board the annual internal auditing by Tamayo Enterprises.
  • Guarantees effective and on-time audits based on the Enterprise Risk Management Framework and a 2 year audit schedule.
  • Reports to the Board all audit findings, recommendations and corrections overtaken.
  • Detects and analyzes opportunities, and discuss proposals for continuous improvement in all school business processes.

The Auditing Committee met on 4 occasions during the past school year to carry out its responsibilities and as a result, presents the following executive summary:

The Committee based its audits on the Enterprise Risk Management Framework and auditing schedule authorized by the board for the past school year.

These identified processes seek to ensure that the ASFM administration complies satisfactorily with the policies and procedures and performs their duties to the highest ethical standards. The work plan involved the auditing of the following processes:

Internal Audit - Grading - Level of Implementation

Edge of Excellence - Needs improvement - Satisfactory - High

Scholarships - Needs improvement - Satisfactory - In process

Prevention against Bullying - Needs improvement - Satisfactory - In process

Legal - Needs improvement - Satisfactory - In process

Food services - Needs improvement - Low

Treasury and banks - Needs improvement - Medium

Payroll - Satisfactory - High

Information Technology (TI) Satisfactory xxxx

Security Controls Needs improvement - Satisfactory xxxx

*Note: None of the internal audit findings resulted in a material weakness but merely control deficiencies that needed management attention


The Edge of Excellence procurement and internal controls audit was completed.

We began the implementation of an Enterprise Risk Management Framework, completing phase two, three, four and five out of five.

    • Phase two: Design of Corporate Policies and Procedures, Risk and Control Matrices, Job Profiles and Org Charts.
    • Phase three: Implementation period of phase two.
    • Phase four: Monitoring which encompasses the testing of the operating effectiveness of the implemented controls.
    • Phase five: Remediation process which requires assurance of actions plans and expected completion dates to mitigate findings reported to management.

In addition, the annual review of the Financial Statements was carried out by External Auditors and one observation was made on the depreciation rates of our fixed assets. This had no financial implications and were approved for the fiscal year that ended on December 31, 2018. The Committee reports that this review was favorable and in compliance with the Mexican Financial Reporting Standards.

Compensation Committee

Committee Chair - Rafael Martínez

Committee Members - Julie Moreira, Verónica Elizondo, Jesús Carmona, Carl Grobien, Michael Adams

Goals of the Committee

  • Ensures that reward policies are aligned to the ASFM strategy, philosophy and practice guidelines.
  • Ensures that the organizational design is in line with the strategic intent of the ASFM.
  • Changes to policy governing base pay, incentives, benefit architecture and headcount, should be noted by the Board Compensation Committee and approved by the Board of Directors.

The Compensation Committee met on multiple occasions during the past school year to carry out its responsibilities and as a result presents the following executive summary:

Over the last four years the Committee has been supporting the ASFM strategic vision of developing our students through top quality teaching and innovation. To achieve that, attracting and retaining quality teachers and administration has been a key focus of the School’s administration.

During this past school year, ASFM concluded the third year of the implementation of a banded, mission-based salary, compensation and benefits program used with all full time teachers and educational personnel. The Committee has worked to align the three year roll-out with our strategic needs and financial capabilities, and has continued to review our compensation structures, expat teacher ratios, and policies as a way to ensure ongoing excellence.

Balanced Scorecard AdHoc Committee

Committee Chair: Dionisio Garza

Committee Members: Julie Moreira, Juan Morales, Michael Adams, Carl Grobien

The BSC AdHoc Committee has been aiding the administration with the final definition and measurement of the BSC phase 1 indicators. We met 3 times during the year to review how to build some metrics and review results. The administration proposed adjustments to some key metrics to make them more accurate and aligned to our strategy.