What Problems Undermine School Board Effectiveness?
Frustration with school boards has reached crisis proportions in several “hot spots” across the nation. In Chicago, for example, most decision-making authority has been transferred to elected local school councils. Ken-tucky’s Education Reform Act of 1990 grants far-reaching powers to the state and to local school councils (Pipho 1992). And in 1991 the state of Massachusetts abolished the nation’s first elected school board in Boston and replaced it with one appointed by the mayor. The problem seems to be exacerbated in large cities, where schools struggle to meet the needs of an increasingly diverse population in an increasingly dangerous setting. Al- though only 4 percent of American school districts enroll more than 10,000 students, almost half of our nation’s students attend these districts (Olson and Bradley 1992). The size of such districts is in itself a problem. In addition, school board-superintendent relations in large cities often fare poorly. In 1990, twenty of the twenty-f
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