St. Mary's School is located in beautiful South Orange County, CA, nestled between the Pacific Ocean, Santa Margarita Mountains, Los Angeles and San Diego. We are an International Baccalaureate school serving over 700 students from Early Preschool to Grade 8. We have approximately 150 faculty and staff members that make up our wonderful community. 

An ideal candidate will have a minimum of 5 years of progressive experience covering all aspects of Human Resources management. Equally important is someone who understands the importance of building and maintaining a strong community through engagement, support, guidance, compassion, integrity and communication.

JOB DESCRIPTION

DIRECTOR OF HUMAN RESOURCES

Reports to: Head of School

Status: Full-time, salaried, exempt, 12-month position (beginning June 2026)

Purpose: To plan, direct, and coordinate human resource management activities in order to maximize the strategic use of human resources and maintain functions such as recruitment, employee compensation and benefits, employee relations, personnel policies, regulatory compliance, and worker's compensation.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

Recruitment

• Plan and facilitate recruiting efforts for all areas of personnel.
• Post and maintain online advertisements.
• Coordinate efforts with third-party recruitment services.
• Distribute resumes to appropriate hiring managers for review.
• Maintain records of employment applicants.
• Schedule and coordinate individual and group interviews for all parties.
• Prepare and send offer letters, employment agreements, and regret letters to candidates.
• Conduct new employee orientations and process new hire paperwork.

Compensation

• Evaluate teaching staff credentials and qualifications and make salary recommendations to the Head of School.
• Create job descriptions in order to better evaluate administrative staff compensation.
• Collaborate with the CFO and Head of School to assist in preparation of the annual payroll budget to ensure that it correctly reflects faculty and staff employees and corresponding their compensation.
• Prepare, send and track annual Employment Agreements for 10-month and 11-month employees.
• Prepare and send annual letters to 12-month employees with salary increases.
• Prepare and send Employment Agreements for Department Chairs and Lead Teachers.
• Prepare and submit stipend requests for Department Chair and Lead Teachers.
• Prepare and provide Employment Agreement for faculty and staff working Summer Resort.
• Serve as a liaison between management and employees by handling questions, interpreting and administering Employment Agreements.

Benefits

• Coordinate employee benefit programs, including health and welfare insurance, vacation, personal and sick pay, and tuition assistance program.
• Coordinate all annual Open Enrollment activities including, brokers meetings, PlanSource changes, printed materials, communications with the broker, carriers and employees, and employee meetings.
• Analyze and recommend changes to benefits practices to establish competitive programs.
• Provide personnel with health and welfare benefit packets upon eligibility.
• Process employee changes such as enrollments, status changes, additions and terminations with benefit broker and insurance carriers.
• Ensure proper employee contributions are in the payroll system on a timely basis.
• Process monthly benefit premiums for payment on a timely basis.
• Process employee changes such as enrollments, status changes, additions and terminations with benefit broker and insurance carriers.
• Track employee vacation, personal and sick pay balances.
• Provide quarterly vacation accrual report to the CFO.
• Process requests for Tuition Assistance. Schedule committee meetings, submit requests, notify employees of the decision, collect transcripts, process check requests, track funding.

Leaves of Absence

• Process requests for employee leaves of absence including FMLA, PDL, CFRA, Military, Workers’ Compensation and Personal leaves.
• Provide required documentation to employees, ensuring that all required forms are received, completed, returned and processed on a timely basis.
• Secure and track employee contribution for health and welfare benefits during leaves of absence.
• Process disability claims from the EDD on a timely basis.
• Provide support to employees throughout their leaves of absence.

Workers’ Compensation

• Work in collaboration with the Director of Operations and Director of Facilities to ensure that any safety concerns are immediately identified and corrected in order to avoid injuries.
• Coordinate with the School Nurse when an employee is ill or injured on the job.
• Provide assistance to the employee if they require treatment at a local clinic or hospital, arrange for transportation when needed.
• Report, process and investigate industrial accidents in a timely manner to ensure state compliance.
• Track workers’ comp claims and ensure that the communication between the employee, attending physician, workers’ comp. carrier and school is timely and productive.
• Coordinate the Return-to-Work Program for injured employees. Review restrictions from the attending physician, identify what, if any, accommodations can be made, identify work that can be done on campus that follows the restrictions.
• Attend quarterly Claims Review meetings with the workers’ comp. insurance carrier.

Employee Relations

• Develop and build on relationships with all faculty and staff to ensure that the Director of HR is a resource for all of their work-related needs.
• Identify and determine causes of personnel problems and assist in resolving matters.
• Provide support and advice to management personnel and staff on employee relations issues.

Policies & Procedures

• Continuously review and implement legal updates to ensure the School is compliant with federal, state and county regulations.
• Advise management personnel on organizational policy matters such as discrimination, equal employment opportunity, harassment, labor law compliance and recommend needed changes.
• Develop recommendations to improve St. Mary's personnel policies and practices ensuring that they reflect the mission and culture of the School.
• Review the school’s Employee Handbook to ensure that stated policies are consistent with current state and federal legislation. Update manual as needed.

Labor Law Compliance

• Maintain records for personnel-related data such as hires, transfers, performance appraisals, disciplinary actions and terminations.
• Study legislation, arbitration and decisions to assess industry trends.
• Ensure St. Mary’s compliance with state and federal employment laws.
• Represent organization at personnel-related hearings and investigations.
• Prepare and submit annual EEOC report to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Employment Terminations

• Ensure legal justification and compliance for school-initiated terminations.
• Coordinate final payments with the Business Office.
• Prepare and provide final packets for the employee which includes, checks for balance of time worked, unpaid vacation and personal time, and a Change in Status Notice.
• Collect, secure and distribute school-issued property to appropriate department managers.
• Conduct final meetings with employees and exit interviews for staff who voluntarily resign from St. Mary’s.
• Process claims for Unemployment benefits. Represent St. Mary’s School in EDD hearings.

Administrative

• Attend Leadership meetings.
• Oversee the training and work product of the Human Resources Assistant.
• Prepare and enter payroll changes into Paychex payroll system.
• Coordinate the distribution and collection of school keys and staff parking passes
• Oversee the employee parking assignments on an annual basis.
• Maintain faculty/staff rosters and phone lists.
• Assist the School in day-to-day operations as needed.

Other

• Support the School and its leadership.
• Other duties as assigned by the Head of School

Minimum Requirements:

1. Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience.
2. Minimum 5 years progressive experience covering all areas of Human Resources Management.
3. Outstanding interpersonal skills with a strong customer service focus (internal and external).
4. Strong written and oral communication skills with an ability to effectively communicate with all stakeholders of the school.
5. Highly ethical and confidential team player.
6. Strong computer skills with a proficiency in MS office suite. Experience with Paychex is plus.
7. High energy, self-starter with ability to successfully prioritize and multi-task in an atmosphere in which time sensitive deadlines are the norm, as are interruptions.

For consideration, please send resume with cover letter indicating salary requirement. Please also note that you found the listing on the NAIS website.

About St. Mary's School

For more information about our school, please visit our website at www.smaa.org

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