What’s the purpose of a school board?
I blogged yesterday about the role public comments play at school board meetings. Today I’m following up with an answer for Kandis, who commented on the entry to ask for a defined purpose of a school board.
To answer her question, I called Jeff Mills, the new executive director of the Oklahoma State School Boards Association.
I’ll start with his response about what a school board is: a local governing body of a school district whose members are either elected or appointed to represent the public. Now on to what they do.
“One of their main functions is to hire a superintendent or a CEO to run that organization. … Their other major responsibility is setting policy,” Mills told me.
He went on to explain: “If I’m a superintendent, I can set a directive or I can set an interoffice activity, but the board is responsible to set legal and legislative type policy to manage the district. … A school board wouldn’t necessarily be involved in the day-to-day operations — that’s what the superintendent or CEO is for.”
Now if you’re wondering just what types of policies he’s referring to, don’t worry, he elaborated. Such policy responsibilities can include everything from school safety to budgeting and expenditures, he said.
Oklahoma City School Board meeting, Sept. 2, 2008 / By Wendy K. Kleinman, The Oklahoman
Mills also talked about the public comments issue that started this conversation.
“There are public participation policies out there, and some of those may limit (comments) to three minutes or so — each one will vary — and they may limit the number of people who may speak on one topic,” Mills said, “for the simple reason that if you have no order you could be there all night.”
UPDATE: To answer a question this entry prompted, school board members’ phone numbers and addresses, at least for Oklahoma City Public Schools, are available to the public. They are listed on this site.
Keep the comments and questions coming!
Wendy Kleinman
Education Reporter
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Comments
What do you do when your School Board waits until Spring Break when teachers are gone to inform the principal of the highest performing school in the district, which has 80% approval rate among parents, that they will not be asked back next year? They are citing parent and teacher complaints. 32 of the 38 teachers(2 others were out of the country) rallied to support their pricipal… does anyone have any idea how to go up against the board when they are going on unfounded information and using quite frankly, unjust, backdoor, slimy politics? Seems like some sort of conspiracy or hidden agenda.
I don’t disagree with what’s stated above about the role of the School Board. I believe in following the chain of command however, when genuine concerns fall of “deaf ears” then where’s the public to go? For example, how long do you tolerate a principal who’s allowed his school to drop consistently from the #1 school in his district to #12 during his 4 year reign? How long do you tolerate a teacher who the parents want to avoid like the plague because of her poor reputation and performance? Or another teacher who laughs because she’s got boxes of new textbooks gathering dust in her closet that she’s not using because the older ones are better? Waste of money? Hello! Or when you know your principal is breaking the School Safety laws that have been established to protect our children? Where do you turn? Our personal solution was to leave the district (Putnam City) and we are now a proud “transfer family” into the Oklahoma City School District.