Who owns the school board?

The enabling legislation which created school boards clearly enshrined a conflict of responsibilities. If this was not intentional, it was a brilliant accident in that it forced boards forever into a state of creative compromise.

There are at least eight constituencies a board member must represent beyond his/her own interests and opinions. Although the enabling legislation did not attempt to rank them, I will here in order of my personal views, from most important to least. You will notice that the lower you go on the list, the bigger the club each constituency carries. That has a lot to do with my ranking: assuming the school board has a great responsibility to balance the playing field between the players. The players nearest the top need the most help in having their voices heard.

Bear in mind also that within each category, board members must balance the needs of their nearest neighbors with those of the most distant. While directors must give a voice to constituents from their own town, they must often act against those interests if the good of the whole district conflicts: a balancing act within a balancing act.

1. Far and away the most important group is the kids. This group has virtually no legal rights and precious little ability to speak for itself, but it is the one for which the board has ultimate moral responsibility. The group must often be protected from assaults by all the other groups. The board member must do much soul-searching about the rights and needs of children, since each other constituency loudly protests how children must be treated, but suggestions and laws put forth often reflect more benefit to other constituencies than to children themselves. It is very difficult to really listen to children or really see them, but that is the director's first responsibility.

2. Parents can speak loudly, but their legal rights are minimal. They have strong and wildly varying opinions about how their children should be raised. Each parent is informed by different values and convictions. Some are sensitive to their children and others are criminally insensitive, yet they have a huge moral presence since they are ultimately the only people intimately concerned with the welfare of their children, from birth to adulthood. They are there before and long after the schools are involved with their children, and must be offered a megaphone to make their views known. They must be protected from schools' incursions into family territory.

3. Teachers have a huge influence on children, yet no real long-term responsibilities. Their views toward raising children, in an ideal world, should be informed by knowledge of child development and education theory, but often are buffeted by personal baggage, political winds, and orders from administrators and bureaucrats who really have far less a clue what is actually happening in the classroom and in children's lives. Teachers have some voice within the school, but are too often silenced by perceived or real threats to their jobs. They are the first to admit that they stand up for children far less than they would in a perfect world.

4. Schools and their administrators might appear to be in the same constituency as teachers, but that is not the reality. There is a tremendous amount of power politics in a school building. In many respects, the professional teachers in a school become just another class of children in a teachers' meeting. There is a culture of power in schools where the same tactics used by teachers to control kids are used on teachers by those "above" them. While those who have never experienced this personally might find it hard to understand, teachers must be protected from the power of the district because they form the second line of defense (after parents) for the rights and needs of children.

5. Unfortunately, the majority of the board's time is occupied in a dance with the superintendent. Legally, the board supervises the superintendent, but the reality is too often the opposite. Since board members have limited hours to spend on school issues, they rely on the superintendent to act as their eyes, ears, and often brain. The superintendent explains requirements and laws, steers the board toward his/her objectives, and strengthens his/her authority through manipulation. In the best of worlds, this is not a struggle of power and personality but a collaboration for the best interest of other stakeholders on this list, but that is unfortunately rare. A superintendent recently admitted in public that he spends the bulk of his time "chasing around managing the school board." While he was admitting something which is more the norm than the exception, this stands the law on its head.

The board hires the superintendent to manage the schools. There is constant tension surrounding what this means. Clearly the board cannot overreach and step on the superintendent's toes. The top administrator must have freedom to manage day-to-day operations and supervise staff. That is not the business of the board beyond its option to fire the superintendent when these functions are not performed to its liking. The board is completely within its rights, however, to insist on defining goals, values, and general direction for the district. To do this effectively, the board must have an overview of district operations not filtered through the superintendents eyes, and therein lies the conflict between necessary delegation and potential micro-management. This is never clear territory.

The fashion recently is to run schools like private corporations. The expectation under that model is the CEO has near total dictatorial control--but schools are not businesses. The board cannot ever forget that it sets the agenda, it evaluates the superintendent every year within strict guidelines, and the superintendent is just one voice among many. If it becomes the superintendent's rubber stamp, it might as well stay home and admit it no longer serves its other constituents.

6. Towns like to think of themselves as the prime constituents of the directors they elect, but they are way down the list. Board members must listen seriously to towns' concerns since the town supports the school financially, provides a context for education, is the seat of values not only of families with children but also of the childless and grandparents....and the town elects and fires directors. Directors may not always make the towns happy, but their towns must trust they will do what they think best for the kids, and thus for the future of the town. The director's responsibility for making education the best it can be conflicts regularly with the need to be fiscally responsible, and this becomes a huge issue for the town since the school budget is its largest expense.

7. The State provides the legal framework for the existence of the board, and exacts in payment a promise that the board will uphold the interests of the State. This is frequently in conflict, though, with the rights and needs of the children and their families, so the directors must walk a fine line. On its side, the State wields laws as clubs, and offers money to those who cooperate and fines to those who don't. The local board can rejoice when the State's interests coincide with local needs, and resist when they don't. There will always be a tension here between the top of this list and the bottom, however, because State and corporate needs for a compliant population are at direct odds with an intelligent individual's right to make up his/her own mind and decide the best course for a happy, rewarding life.

(8. The feds are another level on top of the state, but really exert no direct influence on school boards....only through the states. Still, Washington makes its wishes known in myriad ways, and is a force to be reckoned with.)