The Black Informant

(seattletimes.nwsource.com) “Over the past few years, there has been an outcry from the public for some kind of control to the mess in many big city public school systems. While this proves the point that sinking billions of dollars in these institutions has not worked, asking the mayor of that city to take some level of control over the mess isn’t really a smart solution as well. Seattle has become the latest city to consider such an option.

It’s an idea only a few cities have dared to try.

But advisers to Mayor Greg Nickels are urging him to take at least partial control over Seattle schools.

The conditions, they say, are dire.

Superintendent Raj Manhas is quitting. School Board members are suing the district — and each other — over a school-closure plan that has divided the community. And a recent board meeting erupted in ethnic slurs and an arrest. It will be a challenge, the mayor’s education advisers say, to get voters to approve $900 million in school-district funding measures scheduled for a February election. Attracting an excellent superintendent will be even tougher.

“If I’m a stellar superintendent, what makes me want to come to this kind of place?” said Charles Rolland, a community activist who has twice trooped to City Hall in recent weeks to meet with Nickels, along with other activists, business people and educators.

Rolland and several others are urging Nickels to follow the lead of Boston, Chicago and Philadelphia, where mayors gained power to abolish the elected school boards and appoint some or all new board members, handing the mayors greater control over the public schools.

While some worry that these school systems answer more to City Hall than to students and parents, the results, overall, have been positive, according to academic experts.

No surprise here that the local unions are content with the status quo

Seattle School District and teachers union leaders — who’ve been excluded from the mayor’s meetings — oppose the idea of scrapping an elected board for an appointed one. The 46,000-student district has improved its finances and test scores and hired an outstanding chief academic officer, they say.

Translation: These parents are clueless. Don’t they realize just how good they have it?

The first major city to take sweeping action was Boston in 1991, after the Massachusetts Legislature gave former Mayor Ray Flynn power to abolish the elected School Board and appoint a new one. In a referendum five years later, Boston voters overwhelmingly endorsed the appointive system.

Chicago was next in 1995, with state lawmakers handing city officials similar authority over a demoralized district that had suffered nine teacher strikes in 17 years. Cleveland followed suit in 1998 and New York in 2002.

This year, the mayors of Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and Albuquerque, N.M., all have said they want some control over schools

Then someone makes a very good point:

“You don’t want to get caught in between and end up with the mayor and board having partial control and nobody’s in charge,” Kirst warned.

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