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##  New Patterns of School Governance. ERIC Digest Number 141.                   

School governance has long been a political football, as local,                 state, and federal stakeholders work-sometimes cooperatively and                sometimes at odds-to establish or influence policy and then                     implement accountability measures to track the quality of schools in            the United States. 
Proponents of change have recently recommended             a number of new approaches-and variations on old ones-to meet the               complex challenge of improving public education through different               forms of school governance. However, as with change in any                      organizational setting, resistance has been strong, and the public              debate on the appropriateness of new models for school governance               continues. 
This Digest explains why public-school governance is               the subject of increasing scrutiny, identifies who is held                      accountable for results in the current governance system, and                   describes several recent proposals for transforming governance                  structures. WHY ARE CHANGES IN SCHOOL GOVERNANCE BEING                        RECOMMENDED?Most of the past decade's education reforms were                initiated at the state or the school level, bypassing or ignoring               the school board and district office. Now reformers are zeroing in              on this neglected middle level of governance, hoping that some                  changes--perhaps a redefinition of the role of school boards, closer            teamwork between board and superintendent, or experimentation with              new governance structures-will indirectly stimulate improved                    performance at the school and classroom. 
The latest round of                  debate about the most effective models for school governance was                precipitated by the publication in November 1999 of Governing                   America's Schools: Changing the Rules, a report issued by the                   National Commission on Governing America's Schools and sponsored by             the Education Commission of the States. 
The commission's report               documents the variety of performance standards by which American                schools are being judged. Especially problematic has been the issue             of lagging performance among minority students and students in urban            areas. 
Although there is little quantitative evidence that                    governance structures affect student academic achievement, more                 people seem willing to experiment with altering those structures in             the hope that the changes will stimulate educators and students to              perform at a higher level. 
As Kirst and Bulkley (2000)                        note, "reformers will continue to use governance and organizational             changes in an effort to improve the performance of education, even              though these mechanisms may offer an indirect and uncertain strategy            for improving classroom instruction." WHO'S ACCOUNTABLE IN THE                GOVERNANCE SYSTEM?Much of the discussion of governance focuses              on the sometimes rocky relationships among teachers, principals,                superintendents, and school boards. The implication is that poor                school performance won't be adequately addressed until these groups             work together as a team. 
Some critics blame the system itself and             call for systemic change, while others favor workarounds to the                 current system, such as vouchers, school-choice programs, and                   privatization. Moreover, states differ so widely in their                       educational governance structures that it is difficult to prescribe             a one-size-fits-all solution. A brief list of modern-day governance             interest groups includes mayors, unions, business leaders,                      politicians, and community leaders, in addition to teachers,                    principals, superintendents, and school boards (National                        Commission). 
Superintendents, especially in urban districts, have             taken more than their fair share of the blame for the weaknesses in             current school governance systems. Firing the superintendent is                 usually the first step in addressing governance problems, but this              response seems only to have contributed to a high turnover rate                 and "has often hindered efforts to improve schools" (Johnston                   2000). 
School boards are the other traditional targets in the                 school governance blame game. Numerous observers have been critical             of school boards and their role in public education, especially the             way they interact with school superintendents (Carver 2000, Dawson              and Quinn 2000, Edwards 2000, McAdams and Urbanski 1999). 
A report            by the Educational Research Service and the New England School                  Development Council (Goodman and Zimmerman 2000) notes that "too                many state laws require or allow boards to engage in the operational            detail of a school system," such as hiring staff and adopting                   textbooks. State laws should limit the board's role to policymaking,            assign day-to-day operations to the superintendent, and, most                   important, says the report, empower board and superintendent to                 function as a unified leadership team. WHAT DID THE ECS COMMISSION            RECOMMEND?Recognizing the political and administrative realities            of school governance, the National Commission on Governing America's            Schools recommended, without preference, one of two forms of                    governance: "(1) a system of publicly authorized, publicly funded               and publicly operated schools, based on some of the more promising              trends within the prevailing system of public education governance,             and (2) a system of publicly authorized, publicly funded and                    independently operated schools, based on some of the more promising             alternatives to the prevailing system of public education                       governance." 
The first recommendation extends current governance              structures to include a few experimental strategies; the second                 recommendation effectively argues for increased privatization of                school governance. 
Writing in Education Week, two commission                  members, Donald R. McAdams and Adam Urbanski (1999), provide                    different views on the issues raised by the report. McAdams argues              that a system of independently operated schools-the second option in            the commission's report-would allow school boards to "govern more               and manage less." He believes that if schools were run                          by "individual nonprofit and for-profit organizations, cooperatives,            sole proprietorships, and the like," boards would be free of the                need to focus on the details of how schools are run and instead                 could "set standards, provide resources, and demand                             results." 
Urbanski favors the first option--keeping schools                   publicly operated and improving current governance structures. He               believes decentralized governance structures would allow changes at             the classroom level, where "faculty, staff, and parents in each                 community and at each school would have greater authority and                   capacity to tailor the teaching and learning methods to meet high               standards as well as the unique needs of their students." WHAT                OTHER SCHOOL GOVERNANCE MODELS HAVE BEEN PROPOSED?A few                     economically based strategies for changes in school governance have             been proposed since the publication of the commission's report. Wang            and Walberg (1999) recommend a system of governance whereby states              and local boards would create basic standards that schools could                devise their own ways to meet. 
Thereafter, the authors say,                   schools would be free from "operational regulation or close                     supervision." Schools that failed to meet the standards would have a            set of educational "best practices" imposed upon them. Continued                failure to meet standards would call for a clean sweep of staff or              complete school closure, "in which case. students could be given                scholarships to attend nearby public or private schools."  Thus, all            schools, public or private, would essentially become entrepreneurial            enterprises. "Let schools set their own goals, standards, curricula,            and character," the authors suggest. "Let competition for students              decide which is best." 
A strategy for school governance with a                business mold has been made popular in the recent work of John                  Carver (2000), whose Policy Governance model assigns the school                 superintendent a role parallel to that of the corporate CEO. Carver             says the role of the school board is "to govern the system, rather              than run it." He claims that school boards have traditionally                   micromanaged the educational process, something that would spell                doom for any manager in a business setting. 
A radical redesign of             the function of school boards, Carver explains, would include (1) a             focus on educational results rather than on the methods by which                they were achieved, (2) newly defined relationships with the general            public and parents, and (3) a commitment on the part of the board to            speak with one voice rather than as a group of individuals with                 individual agendas. 
Changing or improving the relationship between            the superintendent and school board looms large in almost all                   proposals for different governance structures. Edwards (2000), a                school board member in Illinois for many years, suggests a form of              governance that "takes the decision-making power out of the hands of            the few (the board) and places it into the hands of many (parents,              teachers, administrators, and community members)." Edwards puts the             locus of control at the building level. "How absurd," Edwards                   notes, "to perpetuate a system in which orders are handed down to               educators from a board composed of people, who, by and large, are               not educators." HAVE ANY CHANGES ALREADY TAKEN PLACE?Dawson               and Quinn (2000), partners in a leadership development consulting               firm, put Carver's Policy Governance model to the test in several               districts in Colorado. In describing the experiences of their                   clients, the authors report that the school boards were better able             to focus on policy issues and that superintendents were better able             to carry out the day-to-day operations for which they were                      responsible. 
Notable among recent developments in school                      governance has been the takeover of several districts by outside                entities when schools fail to make adequate progress on their own.              For a variety of reasons, these takeovers have occurred mostly in               urban districts (Anderson and Lewis 1997). 
Kirst and                          Bulkley (2000) describe the recent mayoral takeovers of several                 urban districts, including Chicago, Boston, Detroit, and Cleveland.             Whether mayors can successfully become educational leaders remains              an open question, and the effect of mayoral control on overall                  school performance will certainly be difficult to                               document. 
Cibulka (2000) concludes that "public school educators              may help to reshape the institution by their willingness to                     experiment with new institutional forms, but they are unlikely to               preserve the 'one best system' as we have known it." He notes                   that "resistance to change" in old structures "is likely to further             weaken the institution's capacity to achieve its goals, and to                  maintain its legitimacy and survival." REFERENCESAnderson, Amy            Berk, and Anne C. Lewis. "Academic Bankruptcy." ECS Policy Brief.               Denver: Education Commission of the States, 1997. 10                            pages. 
Carver, John. "Remaking Governance." American School Board             Journal (March 2000): 26-30. ED 536 841. 
Cibulka, James                       G. "Contests over Governance of Educational Policy: Prospects for               the New Century." In Educational Leadership: Policy Dimensions in               the 21st Century, edited by Bruce Anthony Jones. 3-20. Stamford, CT:            Ablex Publishing, 2000. 
Dawson, Linda J., and Randy                           Quinn. "Clarifying Board and Superintendent Roles." The School                  Administrator (March 2000): 12-14, 18. ED 636 863. 
Edwards,                   Russell J. "A Board View: Let Educators Do Their Job." The School               Administrator (March 2000): 20-22, 24. 
Goodman, Richard H., and               William G. Zimmerman, Jr. Thinking Differently: Recommendations for             21st Century School Board/Superintendent Leadership, Governance, and            Teamwork for High Student Achievement. Arlington, VA: Educational               Research Service; and New England School Development Council, 2000.             33 pages. 
Johnston, Robert C. "Urban Education." Education Week,              April 5, 2000. 
Kirst, Michael, and Katrina Bulkley. "'New,                    Improved' Mayors Take Over City Schools." Phi Deltan Kappan (March              2000): 538-46. 
McAdams, Donald R., and Adam Urbanski. "Governing              Well: Two Approaches From a National Commission For Honing the                  Enterprise to Support Better Schools." Education Week (November 24,             1999): 44, 32-33. 
National Commission on Governing America's                  Schools. Governing America's Schools: Changing the Rules. Denver:               Education Commission of the States, 1999. 59 pages. 
Wang, Margaret            C., and Herbert J. Walberg. "Decentralize or 'Disintermediate'?"                Education Week (December 1, 1999): 1, 36, 52. 
A Product of the                ERIC Clearinghouse on Educational Management, College of Education,             University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon 97403-5207 ----- 
This                    publication was prepared with funding from the Office of Educational            Research and Improvement, U.S. Department of Education, under                   contract No. ED-99-C0-0011.  The ideas and opinions expressed in                this Digest do not necessarily reflect the positions or policies of             OERI, ED, or the Clearinghouse. This Digest is in the public domain             and may be freely reproduced. The text of this Digest may be viewed             electronically at http://eric.uoregon.edu EA 030 593.                        **Title:** New Patterns of School Governance. ERIC Digest Number 141.                   **Document Type:** Information Analyses---ERIC Information Analysis Products (IAPs) (071); Information Analyses---ERIC Digests (Selected) in Full Text (073); **Available From:** ERIC Clearinghouse on Educational Management, 5207 University of                Oregon, Eugene, OR 97403-5207. Tel: 800-438-8841 (Toll Free). For               full text: http://eric.uoregon.edu.                                          **Descriptors:**  Administrative Organization, Change Strategies,  Educational                   Administration,  Educational Change, Educational Improvement,                   Elementary Secondary Education,  Governance, Summative Evaluation            **Identifiers:**
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