"Highly Qualified School Board Members:" Raising the Entry Qualifications
Justin Bathon on Wednesday, January 12, 2011 at 10:26AM News out of Colorado today has a school board member bringing his gun to school board meetings because of his fear of retaliation over comments he made on his radio show. His comments were to the effect of denigrating and downright insulting Martin Luther King, Jr. The school board member is, apparently, an openly white supremacist and broadcasts his ideas over the radio and internet. In response to his "ideas," he has allegedly received death threats.
In light of the recent school board shooting in Florida and still within the context of events during the previous week in Tucson, this board member feels the best idea is just to bring his gun with him to the school board meeting in case he needs to engage in a shoot-out, wild-west style, I guess.
Aside from this obvious craziness, how do we get rid of folks like this, legally? The Colorado Constitution (Art. 9, Sec. 15), as well as many other states, require there to be a local board of education, so doing away with the whole thing is out of the question barring a constitutional amendment or convention. Further, attempting to impeach (for lack of a better word) a school board member would be procedurally complex and extended, meaning the member's term is likely to expire before the litigation completes. So, now what?
How about this ... could we substantially raise the entry qualifications? We just got through a whole national push for "Highly Qualified Teachers," so perhaps it is time for a national push for "Highly Qualified School Board Members."
Most board qualifications look something like this, where the minimum qualifications are just to be a human adult and live in the district. In fact, that Louisiana one I just cited is unique in that it requires the board member to be able to read and write. Most, it seems, do not. In fact, likely the most complicated thing about running for school board is filling out the nominating papers.
So, what about requiring a college degree to serve on a school board? Such a requirement would be legally possible, it seems. In particular Kentucky seems to be a leader on this front in requiring their board members to have completed the 12th grade or have received a GED certificate. In 1990, with KERA, we increased this from 8th grade to 12th grade, so increases are not out of the question. Further, case law in Kentucky has upheld these educational provisions (Commonwealth v. Norfleet (272 Ky. 800, 1938)). Thus, perhaps other states should consider this model and perhaps it is also time to increase the educational attainment to at least an Associates or Bachelors degree?
In the same way that the federal government put forth the Highly Qualified definition, they could do the same thing for board members. It is a bit more complex because board members are elected officials, but I think the smart people in Washington could figure it out. Alternatively, states could just take it on themselves to increase board member qualifications. Politically, it seems, such a bill in the state legislature would not be dead on arrival, like some other possible changes to school board structure.
Okay, the downside. While I don't see much downside, I do think it could harm representation particularly in two areas, minorities and the aging/elderly. Because drop-out and college attainment rates are lower in some minority populations, there would be less of a pool of candidates in some areas of the county. But, to me, even more of a reason to have college graduates on the board as examples to the students. Secondly, the bigger problem it seems, is that some elderly would not qualify not as a result of their lack of knowledge or hard work, but simply as a result of generational shifts in educational expectations. Because many current board members are older individuals (have a look at the rest of the board in Colorado), a phase-in provision might have to be added to compensate for these generational differences. Certainly there would have to be a grandfathering provision for all existing board members (no pun intended, of course).
This kind of provision certainly would not get rid of all the crazy people. Remember, this guy had no problem attaining degrees from top schools. And, this guy in Colorado may well have a college degree, especially since it is a university town. But, generally, entry requirements for school board members would likely increase the quality and expectations of local school boards. Given that they are the true entity legally tasked with running local schools (not administrators or teachers), I think a national push to set a minimum educational attainment for local school boards makes perfect sense.
Reader Comments (6)
I like the idea of increasing the competence (and sanity) of school board members, but I think a better solution is a market-based one. Currently, the compensation for most school board members is so low that the job realistically is limited to: (1) retirees; (2) stay-at-home moms or dads with older kids; (3) the independently wealthy; and (4) people who have "day jobs" like this man in Colorado, which do not require much time commitment during normal school board operating hours.
Why not just increase the pay to something that a person could conceivably live on? We could even peg it to the starting teacher salary in the district. That would allow people to choose to run without sacrificing their financial security. The resulting board would be much more representative of the actual community, and it would likely be more sane in the aggregate.
Let's not forget another option. It used to be that the school board was appointed by the Township Trustees or Mayor. This would cause a very different type of board but might help keep the white supremacists off the board. The downside is the potential of a more politicized board which doesn’t help – trust me I know of a current board member that seems to be running for some higher office while at the table it is gross and not real productive. I do work in a district with all college educated board members and it doesn’t always help…
A college degree component would raise the standard of supposed competence to a level higher than that of the president. That doesn't sound weird when put in context?
I sometimes become frustrated with the thinking of some board members, but I find level of education to rarely be the issue. The issue seems to be with:
--Poor preparation in what it means to govern
--Personal issues prioritized over issues of greater governing importance
--Stubborness
--Inability to navigate conflict (which is always present)
--Cowardice when conviction is needed
--The need to rise one's self up at the expense of lowering others
--Love of the game of gotcha'
--Political ideology
On a more philosophical note, I would hate to isolate people from a democratic process due to level of education. Everyone deserves a shot at civic engagement - even if their opinions and actions may be less informed than I would like.
@Scott - a market based approach would scare me even more. There is no doubt that we could not pay at a level to adequately compensate professionals for their time. So, I think the group it would inspire to consider running ... well, let's just say they are not the professionals. Not only that, but if there is a profit motivation, I think that might be bad for kids. The flip side, though, and what is attractive to me about it is that if you paid them, then we could hold them to a higher level of responsibility. We could force them to attend conferences and PD's. Force them to show up a school events, etc. That would probably help.
@Chris, yeah, I thought about bringing that up in my post, as many urban districts have switched to that model. It would certainly be one that would need to be considered. I'm not sure whether it would be preferable or not, but I'm open to the possibility of that.
@Joel - folks without a college degree can be on the sewer commission (just joking :). But, why can't we treat schools differently? If the enterprise is about education, why can't we require some of the oversight personnel to have some? I agree with your assessment of school boards, but we are constitutionally barred from saying Republicans can't serve. And, their lack of personal, governmental or moral skill is not something we can exactly write a test for and exclude people on that basis. I am fine with us offering PD to these new members, but PD is not going to solve some of that. We have a better chance of some of those issues being resolved in the 4 years on a College campus than we do in 2 weekends of PD.
We all seem to agree that the current state of school boards is not sufficient. So, I think there is some impetus to ask whether the better policy is to protect the open democratic system or to add regulations that heighten our chances at quality (option, 3, of course being whether there should be school boards at all, and not just an appointed superintendent or something as some urban districts are trying). This route seems to me to be an easy first step to raising the quality. I still think it is one states should consider taking.
I agree with some of Scott's sentiment that the unwritten requirements play a significant role in who self-selects to run for a school board. In making any changes to the time commitments and financial sacrifices required of board members, policymakers should keep in mind the needs of people who they do want on the board. Likely, you don't want every Joe and Susie off the street to throw in their two cents. But you want people who:
A) Are incredibly familiar with problems that todays young people face
B) Have experience actually solving problems like these
If you want a school district to be run more like a Fortune 500 company, find a way to attract some C or VP-level management. If you need to know more about the challenges your students who go into the military will face, find someone with that experience. If the district needs the discipline and quick execution of a sports team, figure out the attraction for the best athletics coaches in your area. If your schools are struggling prepare artists, find what would make the tenure on a school board mutually beneficial for some designers and musicians.
In the same way that I am the reflection of my 5 closest friends, organizations are the reflection of the personalities of their strongest members. What type of people do you want controlling the personality of your school board?
Justin - perhaps the question to explore is, "Do school boards have a positive impact on the goals of the organization?"
A colleague of mine just finished his dissertation on that issue, and I am finishing mine on school boards and hiring practices. The body of research about school boards and efficacy is not exactly well-studied (but interesting nonetheless).