Proposal ● Unified Platform & Website
July 2026 ● Prepared for The Summit School
Nine systems today.
One platform tomorrow.
01 Executive Summary
Everything under one roof, for well under one tuition.
The Summit School currently runs its website, enrollment, fundraising, tutoring, and communications across at least six disconnected platforms — and the Summit Resource Center, the fastest-growing revenue arm, runs on a Google Sheet. Every vendor consulted (Monday.com, Salesforce, FinalSite) said the school's parallel-program model requires two systems. This proposal replaces them with one custom platform: one login, one database, one place where a student, a summer camper, a tutoring client, and a donor all live — built specifically around how Summit actually works, owned outright by the school, with hosting and support as the only recurring costs.
$21,700+/yr
What the current stack costs, forever
$25,000
One-time build, phases 1–3
$3,900/yr
Total recurring after launch
~Month 17
Break-even vs. doing nothing
Note: current-spend figures are from our July 16 meeting — FinalSite website ($7,700) + FinalSite enrollment ($7,800) + TutorBird ($1,200) are confirmed; Bloomerang is estimated at $5,000 until the real invoice is checked. Every comparison below uses these numbers.
02 Today vs. Tomorrow
Five logins, four vendors, zero connections — versus one system.
FinalSite — Website
Public site · mass email
$7,700 / yr
FinalSite — Enrollment
Applications · parent portal
$7,800 / yr
Bloomerang + Qgiv
Donors · tickets · auction · 3 logins
est. $5,000 / yr
TutorBird
Tutor attendance → billing
$1,200 / yr
Google Sheets
The entire SRC "CRM"
free — and costing you clients
FACTS
Tuition + financial aid
$ unknown
vs.
The Summit Platform
One login · one database · yours outright
- Unified CRM — students & donors
- SRC pipelines & scheduler
- Admissions & enrollment portal
- Custom form builder
- Email & automations
- Events, ticketing & auction
- Tutor billing & progress notes
- New public website + AI chat
- Granular roles & permissions
- Payments built in
$3,900/yrtotal recurring · after a one-time build
Where the money goes today
Known annual platform spend, per vendor · figures from our July 16 meeting
* Free in license fees — expensive in lost follow-ups: 85 campers and 50 waitlisted families currently receive no ongoing communication at all.
03 What You Get
You've already seen it — it's clickable today.
A working mockup of the back end is live now, in Summit's real branding, with three switchable layout options on every major page so each department can choose how their workspace reads. What you see below is the actual design direction — not a stock template.
Katie's Tuesday morning — follow-up reminders, pipelines at a glance, today's schedule. The Google Sheet, retired.
One student, whole story — linked parents, service tabs that appear as services attach, restricted documents, form status.
Fully mobile — bottom app bar, thin contact cards, notifications.
Every service, its own pipeline — with per-stage automations you control.
04 Side by Side
What the current stack can't do — and this can.
| Capability | Current Stack | Summit Platform |
|---|---|---|
| One record per person, everywherestudent, camper, tutoring client & donor in one profile | split across 4+ tools | |
| Standalone contacts (donors, friends)people with no student link as first-class records | Bloomerang only | |
| Do-not-contact / marketing opt-outsuppress without deleting history | delete or get emailed | |
| Automatic tagging & segmentscamp-2026, tutoring-2026 applied by the system | ||
| Follow-up automations you define"2 weeks since testing inquiry → task for Katie" | ||
| Staff-editable forms, instant publishpolicy tweaks live in minutes, not a support ticket | clunky, per-tool | |
| SRC pipelines with scheduler + paymentstesting, benchmarking, tutoring, camp — each its own stages | Google Sheets | |
| Tutor attendance, notes & in-house billingweekly progress form → parent-ready report | attendance only | |
| Applicant progress bar + stage-assigned formsparents always know where they stand | ||
| Once-ever vs. annual form rulesmedia release signed once; only real annuals recur | ||
| Events in chronological orderyes, really | entry order | |
| Field-level permissionshide financial-aid amounts per user, not per login | ||
| AI chat that books real toursreads live availability, guarded on sensitive topics | ||
| You own itcode, data, and roadmap belong to Summit — no per-seat fees, ever | rented forever |
05 The Build, Phase by Phase
Each phase ships usable. Katie works while we build.
The CRM is the backbone — it lands first, with SRC and the new website. From there each division is added onto a system already in daily use, exactly like the pattern discussed in our meeting. A roles-and-permissions pass and a department walkthrough close out every phase.
1
Foundation — CRM · SRC · Website · Chatbot
10–12 weeks · retires Google Sheets + TutorBird + FinalSite website
- CRM core: contacts, linked families, standalone donors, tags, lists, history
- Form builder: signatures, uploads, read-and-acknowledge, instant publish
- SRC pipelines: testing, benchmarking, tutoring, summer camp
- Scheduler + payments (Authorize.net or Stripe)
- Tutor module: attendance, weekly progress notes, in-house billing
- Automations engine: your triggers, your rules
- Communications: shared templates, segmented sends, opt-out
- New public website: prospect-family-focused, mini pre-filled CTAs
- AI chatbot: tour booking, guarded FAQs, chat log review
- Roles & permissions pass + Katie/Kassie walkthrough
$12,500
Fixed price
50% at kickoff · 50% at launch
2
Admissions & Enrollment Portal
5–6 weeks · retires FinalSite enrollment ($7,800/yr)
- Pipeline: inquiry → applicant → enrolled, staff-only moves
- Application: uploads, photo, educator questionnaire, $110 fee
- PDF export of applications for offline review
- Parent portal with applicant progress bar
- Stage-assigned forms: policies, pickup, health, immunizations
- Re-enrollment rollover + once-ever vs. annual form rules
- Open house & tour tracking on the record
- Roles & permissions pass + Nancy walkthrough
$6,500
Fixed price
50% at kickoff · 50% at launch
3
Development, Events & Giving
5–7 weeks · retires Bloomerang + Qgiv (est. $5,000/yr)
- Donor management: gifts, campaigns, acknowledgments
- Capital campaign tracking (new building fund)
- Event registration & ticketing: golf, Bash, Bingo, talks
- Online auction for the annual Bash
- In-person payments (Stripe Terminal or Square kept)
- Board-friendly email templates
- Roles & permissions pass + Tiana walkthrough
$6,000–8,000
Firm after discovery w/ Tiana
Range narrows once auction logistics are scoped
4
Tuition Management — optional, whenever ready
3–4 weeks · trims the FACTS bill (financial aid stays on FACTS)
- Deposits: $3,500 / $5,000 by contract date
- Payment plans: 1, 2, or 9 installments
- Mid-year proration
- FACTS integration for financial aid decisions
$4,500
Optional — price held 12 months
Timeline — first three phases
Assuming an October 1 start · shifts with your fiscal-year decision · diamond = launch
OctNovDecJanFebMarAprMayJun
Phase 1CRM · SRC · website
CRM + website live — Katie off the Sheet
Phase 2Admissions portal
Enrollment live for 2027–28 season
Phase 3Development & events
Ready before fall events
Phases 2 and 3 can slide into the next fiscal year without touching Phase 1 — the platform is built to be extended live. Enrollment timing targets the winter admissions season; development lands before the fall golf tournament.
06 The Numbers
Spend once, own it — then watch the lines cross.
Annual recurring cost — current stack vs. Summit Platform
After the build, hosting + support is the only bill
Keeps rising with vendor pricingHosting $75/mo + support $250/mo
Three-year total cost — keep renting vs. build & own
Cumulative spend · build payments spread across the phase timeline · hover for values
Current stack ($21.7k/yr, flat — realistically it rises)
Summit Platform (build + $3.9k/yr)
Labels are on the chart; the same numbers, as a table: current stack — $21.7k / $43.4k / $65.1k at years 1–3; platform — $28.9k / $32.8k / $36.7k. Every year after year 3 widens the gap by ~$17.8k.
$25,000
Phases 1–3, one-time (Ph 3 at low end)
$17,800/yr
Recurring savings once the stack is retired
$28,400
Ahead by end of year 3 — and compounding
$0
Per-seat fees, per-module fees, "add-on" fees
Payment schedule — phases 1–3
Each phase invoices 50% at kickoff, 50% at launch — no phase billed before it starts
Kickoff
$6,250
Phase 1 begins — CRM, SRC, website
Ph 1 launch
$6,250
Katie live · website live
Ph 2 kickoff
$3,250
Admissions build begins
Ph 2 launch
$3,250
Enrollment portal live
Ph 3 kickoff / launch
$3,000 ×2
Development & events live
Fiscal-year flexibility: phases are independently committable. Sign Phase 1 now against this year's budget; Phases 2–3 can bill next fiscal year. Marketing budget stays intact — and each completed phase cancels a vendor bill that partially self-funds the next one.
07 After Launch
Two line items. That's the bill.
- Hosting — $75/mo ($900/yr). Managed cloud hosting, SSL, daily off-site backups, monitoring, and staging environment. Your data never leaves infrastructure you control.
- Support & maintenance — $250/mo ($3,000/yr). Laravel/security updates, uptime response, bug fixes, and a monthly block for small changes (new form fields, template tweaks, a new report). Bigger features are quoted as mini-phases.
- Payment processing stays with your processor at their rates (Authorize.net ~3% today, or Stripe 2.9% + 30¢) — same as now, not a platform fee.
- No per-seat pricing. Add staff, tutors, and board members freely.
08 Security & Compliance
Built like it holds medical records — because it does.
- Segregated document storage — immunization records, psych evals, and financial-aid PDFs encrypted at rest, access-logged, permission-gated. HIPAA-conscious by design.
- No SSNs in form fields, ever. Sensitive uploads and typed data stored on separate paths.
- Field-level permissions — financial-aid amounts hidden per user; department-scoped views.
- Student names never public — consistent with your no-names social policy.
- Your database, single-tenant — no data shared with other schools, no vendor mining.
- Confirmation guards on destructive actions, as requested. ("Are you sure?" — yes, Nancy, we built it.)
09 What Stays
Integrate, don't replace.
- Alma SIS stays — grades, attendance, schedules, report cards. We sync demographics so nobody re-keys a student.
- Google Classroom stays — assignment grading is out of scope, on purpose.
- FACTS stays for financial aid — external reviewers are mandatory; we integrate the handoff like the background-check precedent.
- Authorize.net or Stripe — your call; both supported. We'll compare effective rates before Phase 1 payments go live.
10 Assumptions
What this quote counts on.
- Phase 3 price firms up after a discovery session with Tiana (auction logistics are the main variable).
- Website content comes from Kassie's page-by-page document; copywriting beyond restructuring is collaborative.
- Alma and FACTS integrations assume standard API/export access; if a vendor blocks access, we fall back to import/export flows at no extra cost.
- Bloomerang's real annual cost to be confirmed for the comparison — the estimate here is conservative.
- Prices valid 60 days; Phase 4 price held 12 months from Phase 1 signature.
11 Next Steps
Three meetings and a signature away from kickoff.
- 1 · Review this proposal + the live mockup with Nancy, Kassie, and leadership — pick your layout direction (A / B / C, mix and match per page).
- 2 · Discovery walkthroughs — Katie (SRC pipelines, ~90 min) and Tiana (development & auction, ~60 min). Phase 3 price firms up here.
- 3 · Confirm the numbers — real Bloomerang invoice, payment processor choice, fiscal-year timing for Phases 2–3.
- 4 · Sign Phase 1 — kickoff scheduled within two weeks of signature; first walkthrough build in your hands within a month.