There are many proposals for how to do this and movement in different directions, but one of the most popular directions now is decentralization.
Rules force all schools to be the same, the theory goes.
They make flexibility difficult, if not impossible. In bureaucracies, employees are rewarded for complying with rules rather than for educating students. And rules, the theory continues, are made to make life easier for officials rather than to make schools more effective for students. Also, children are all different, as are their teachers, so if were to have good schools, they will each have to be as different as our students and teachers. A similar theory was advanced 25 years ago in the New York City school decentralization battle.