Why I Built CharterSelect

I started my career in insurance the same way most brokers do — working inside large firms with big client lists and corporate mandates. Early on I identified charter schools as an underserved niche and made a deliberate choice to go deep. What I found was a community I never expected to fall in love with.

One of my first calls from a charter school CFO came while she was driving a school bus, asking me about a workers compensation audit. That moment told me everything I needed to know about this community. Entrepreneurial, mission-driven, wearing ten hats at once, and almost always underserved by brokers who saw them as too small to matter.

I spent 15 years fighting that from the inside — pushing for better coverage, earlier renewals, and creative solutions for schools that couldn't afford to get it wrong. Too small to matter to the firm. Too important to me to accept that. So I stopped fighting from the inside and built something from scratch.

CharterSelect exists for one reason. To be the broker I always wanted to be for the schools that deserve it most. Independent, carrier-agnostic, and built entirely around your mission — not a corporation's bottom line. A portion of every policy we write goes back to the communities our schools serve, because that's what this work is actually for.

If you've ever felt like your broker doesn't really understand your world, you're probably right. Let's fix that.

The Burnt Out Educator Podcast

When Success Isn't Enough: Aaron Schwen on Leaving Corporate to Build with Purpose

Coach Joe sits down with Aaron to discuss why he walked away from a successful corporate insurance career to build a company centered around service instead of sales quotas.