Do elected school boards cause dysfunctional schools? Is public education best run by people who are not elected to office?
This morning's Washington Post has a piece on the success of school reform in Boston, a model being adopted by the D.C. school superintendent. But there's a problem, critics don't think he's moving fast enough. They think he could move faster if the school board were appointed by the mayor, that elected boards are too politicized to make real changes with any speed. The trend is to allow mayors to appoint their school boards, as in Boston and New York City.
So while the US is working so hard to bring "democracy" to the world, here at home we are deciding that at the most basic levels it doesn't work and needs to be stopped? Is democracy actually one of the lead causes of the problems with our school systems? Does anyone else find this a disturbing contradiction?