Will Mayoral Control Make the Grade?

After months of debate and public hearings, it's hard to imagine there's anything left unsaid about Mayor Adrian Fenty's plan for mayoral control of the District's schools. Parents, staff, and a passel of mayors and superintendents have offered inspirational accounts from New York and Boston, addressed particulars of the proposal, and voiced frustration with school construction and textbook distribution, while skeptics have countered with a chorus of critiques and cautions.

Somewhat lost amidst this cacophony has been the question of what we actually know about mayoral control of schools, in general. Contrary to the strong claims of some proponents, there is little rigorous evidence demonstrating the impact of mayoral control.

Just one study, a 2001 analysis by Kenneth Wong and Francis Shen, examined multiple districts and found achievement gains associated with mayoral control. However, given their limited sample of fourteen cities, they suggest treating the findings with great caution. In 2005, Wong and Shen examined finances and staffing in the nation's 100 largest urban districts, this time reporting that mayoral takeovers did not improve financial stability.

The handful of earlier systematic studies on other governance reforms produced equally ambiguous results. A 1967 study by Thomas Dye examined 67 large cities and found "no significant differences in educational outcomes between school systems with elected and appointed boards." A 1978 study of elected school boards by Harvey Tucker and L. Harmon Zeigler found elected school boards no more responsive to public demands than appointed boards.

These studies are the exception; generally, little research has considered the benefits of mayoral control. For instance, in the most extensive examination of school boards to date, the 2005 book Ten Thousand Democracies, two Penn State University professors examined more than 7,000 school boards but conducted no analysis of the effects of mayoral control or school board appointment on achievement, governance, or school reform.

Most of the existing research consists of case studies of cities like Boston, Chicago, and Cleveland. The findings are equivocal. Stanford University's Michael Kirst concludes, typically, that it is "difficult to predict" whether mayoral control will help.

The uncertain evidence should remind us that structural or organizational changes—like shifting from an elected board to mayoral control—guarantee nothing except new possibilities. Ultimately, the case for mayoral control in big cities rests on the conviction that undisciplined politics, acrimonious governance, and a lack of accountability make transforming troubled schools, hard enough under the best of conditions, well near impossible.

Moreover, the low voter turnout and low level of awareness that mark board elections routinely enable organized interests, especially unions representing public school employees, to exert an unhealthy influence. This produces lax leadership unwilling to upset the status quo. Big city elected boards have also demonstrated a lack of coherence and continuity and a tendency to micromanage, while operating in isolation from political and civic leadership.

There are also real concerns about mayoral control. Mayors may politicize school systems in self-serving ways or neglect schools for other priorities; marginal neighborhoods can have more difficulty being heard; and transparency, and with it accountability, can suffer. Education historian Diane Ravitch warns that mayoral control in New York has meant, "The Department of Education now operates in a secretive manner that denies the right of the public…even to know what policy is being considered."

The current state of urban school systems suggests that how mayoral control is adopted matters more than whether it is.

The reality is that urban school systems are so hidebound, boards frequently so tangled, and coherence and patience so absent from their organizational DNA that handing the reins to an engaged and accountable mayor may make good sense.

That said, the preceding suggests that how mayoral control is adopted matters more than whether it is. In fact, the District provides a cautionary tale of just this point. Locals recall that just a few years ago the D.C. school board was reconfigured to include four mayoral appointees and five elected members. This "hybrid" model was hailed by key players as superior to straight mayoral control, but today it is deemed ineffectual. Former mayor Anthony Williams, after championing the plan, eventually derided his partial authority board as "trying to drive a car with one pedal."

Before the D.C. City Council gives Mayor Fenty his wish, and before other districts follow suit, they should draw four key lessons from the evidence:

Transparency is essential. In the past decade, in cases like Tyco and WorldCom, corporate America saw that overly cozy boards could fail to provide essential scrutiny. The council should insist on regular public hearings and reports on district affairs.
Strong oversight is a prerequisite for transparency. In New York, the civic leadership and the newspapers have sometimes allowed enthusiasm to trump healthy skepticism. Mayoral accountability only works when local public officials and civic leaders are prepared to ask hard questions and insist on verifiable measures of performance.
Leaders must agree, in advance, what metrics will be used to judge the success of their efforts. These must include more than test scores and graduation rates—practical measures for gains in teacher quality, transportation, student safety, construction, finances, and other key responsibilities should be established.
Finally, mayoral control only works where, as in Boston or Chicago, mayors put their reputations on the line and their political clout to work. The council should demand some form of "earnest money"—in the form of concrete commitments and hard-nosed political leadership—if it is to be convinced that the frenetic Fenty will remain focused while juggling economic development, public safety, and a multitude of constituent concerns. Vague promises and grand plans will not suffice.

Mayoral control can provide an opportunity for stability, clarity, and broad-based political support for school improvement. That will only happen, however, if accompanied by transparency, accountability, focus, and patience. If the council does what it can on that front, it can in good conscience hand the mayor the keys.

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