The Vital Role of Boards of Education: Shaping Education and Community Futures
School boards, also known as boards of education or school committees, play a crucial role in shaping the education system. More than just policymakers and administrators, school board members are elected officials who represent the collective voice and interests of the local community. Boards usually consist of five to nine elected or appointed representatives from the community, who meet regularly to discuss and decide issues related to local schools.
The Essence of School Boards
A school board, often referred to as a board of education, is a corporate body that oversees and manages a public school district's affairs, personnel, and properties. School board members are local officials. Their authority and duties are defined by the state and federal constitutions and laws, as well as by rules and regulations.
In California, there are approximately 1,000 school districts and county offices of education that are governed by more than 5,000 school board members. State board members are diverse in terms of race, ethnicity, and gender; operate within diverse governance models and varied terms of office; are engaged in their communities; and are committed to education.
Key Responsibilities and Duties
School boards are responsible for the education of a community’s young people, ensuring all students have access to a high-quality, rigorous education that prepares them for college, career, and life. Nationwide, school boards control more than $600 billion annually and oversee the education of 50 million students.
Here's a breakdown of their core functions:
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- Setting Policy: School boards set policy that determines how schools operate, what’s taught, and how success is measured. Authority is granted to the board as a whole, not each member individually. No one board member can bind the school board to a particular action. Boards of education act only as a whole and during public meetings.
- Approving Budgets: This involves approving budgets that can range from a few million to hundreds of millions.
- Hiring and Evaluating the Superintendent: School boards select superintendents for their districts. This decision is considered their most important decision since superintendents serve as the chief executive officers of school boards. The superintendent answers to the board, implements policies and directives, makes recommendations, provides leadership, and generally serves as a resource.
- Engaging the Community: It’s critical that school board members listen to and respond to community concerns and explain the district’s priorities to the public. The school board, district leadership, and families work together to promote high-quality education for students.
- Ensuring Equity: School boards can also take an active role in promoting equity and making sure all students get a high-quality education.
- Setting Academic Standards: As elected officials, school board members set the achievement standards for schools within the community. Effective school boards set a vision for a community’s young people, helping them achieve a world-class education that prepares them for life beyond high school. Broader tasks include setting high academic standards.
- Supporting Teachers and Staff: Supporting teachers and staff is another crucial task.
- Ensuring Transparency and Accountability: School boards are accountable for how schools-and students-perform.
- Creating a Safe and Positive School Culture: Creating a safe and positive school culture is essential.
- Advancing Policies: School boards advance policies that allow every student to thrive.
- Ratifying Contracts: School boards ratify contracts with employee bargaining units.
The Significance of Community Engagement
School boards accomplish this by creating strong relationships with parents, teachers, students, and community members. Some school boards also create space for students to join, serve, and provide valuable input. Incorporating student voices on school boards is crucial for creating an equitable and inclusive education system. It provides a platform for students to voice concerns and ideas, leading to informed decision-making that considers the diverse perspectives of all stakeholders. It also fosters civic engagement, promotes collaboration between students, educators, and administrators, and develops leadership skills.
Everyone can get involved in their local school boards, by attending meetings, asking questions, learning more about candidates, or even deciding to run for office themselves.
The Role of the State Board of Education
The State Board of Education is an elected, constitutional body that sets policy and ensures that the State Department of Education functions effectively within the framework developed by the state Legislature and the board.
School Boards in Iowa
Iowa's public education system includes: Local school districts serving students in pre-kindergarten through 12th grade Area Education Agencies (AEAs) that provide support and assistance to the districts in a given region Community colleges that provide a wide range of coursework to students of all ages Four-year colleges and universities The Iowa Department of Education and State Board of Education are responsible for the local schools, AEAs, and community colleges, while the Iowa Board of Regents is responsible for the state's three public four-year universities.
Each local school district in Iowa must offer a complete education in all grades from kindergarten through 12th grade. All state residents are entitled to free public education up to age 21 and state law requires that all learners between the ages of 6-16 attend school either in their assigned "resident" district, through open enrollment to another district, or through private instruction (home schooling).
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While local districts are governed by state and federal laws that set broad parameters regarding coursework requirements, assessments, and teacher qualifications, each has its own locally elected board of directors that sets specific policy, defines academic requirements, and approves the local budget.
Districts are accredited through a differentiated accountability system. All districts and accredited nonpublic schools submit information to the state Department of Education to ensure the district is meeting state and federal requirements. Based on this information, districts may receive additional support as needed to meet requirements and/or to engage in continuous school improvement.
Iowa’s academic standards outline and define what students should be able to do at specified grade levels by subject area; they do not prescribe or mandate any particular curriculum. Each district selects its own local curriculum, textbooks and other classroom materials. Iowa Administrative Code 281-12 outlines requirements for local school boards to establish procedures for developing, implementing and evaluating their district’s total curriculum.
Generally, elementary grades 1-6 must teach language arts, social studies, math, science, health, physical education, traffic safety, music and visual arts. Junior high grades 7-8 must teach language arts, social studies, math, science, health, human growth and development, physical education, music, visual art, family and consumer education, career education and technology education. High school grades 9-12 must offer at a minimum six units of language arts, five units of social studies, six units of math, five units of science, one unit of health, one unit of physical education, three units of fine arts, four units of foreign language, and 12 units of vocational education.
All classroom teachers must be properly licensed and certified in their subject area. Iowa has nine area education agencies or AEAs. AEAs are regional service agencies that provide school improvement services for students, families, teachers, administrators, and their communities. Each AEA is governed by a locally elected board of directors of between five and nine members, responsible for ensuring the AEA operates in the best interests of the students in accordance with state law. The AEAs work as educational partners with public and accredited private schools. Iowa has a statewide system of 15 community colleges. These public, postsecondary, two-year institutions are organized as comprehensive community colleges. Each college serves a multi-county merged area that may vary in size from four to twelve counties; all of Iowa's 99 counties are included in one of these merged areas. Community colleges are governed by locally elected boards of directors that consist of from five to nine members who are elected for terms of three years. Each community college offers a comprehensive educational program. All Iowans of postsecondary school age are eligible to attend any of the community colleges. The Department was created by the 35th General Assembly in 1913 and was originally called the Department of Public Instruction. The current name was adopted in 1986. In its early years, the Department was charged with working with the many small, isolated school buildings to build a formal system of public education that included organized districts with defined duties and boundaries, as well as specific qualifications for teachers. While the state department was established to provide oversight, local schools maintained the authority to set many of the rules and requirements for their own students. This system of "local responsibility" - based on the belief that local residents have the greatest interest in assuring their children's success - continues today. As Iowa grew over the decades to encompass greater diversity in business, industry and population, the public education system evolved to reflect those changes. In the 1960s, a system of 15 public, two-year community colleges was established to provide more students the opportunity for continued education and training beyond high school. In the mid-1970s, the system of AEAs was developed to provide regional support for local schools and their teachers. Originally, the community colleges and the AEAs shared the same service area boundaries.
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Compensation and Motivation
In most districts, school board members are not paid. Some might receive a small stipend. According to the National School Boards Association (NSBA), 75% of small-district school board members receive no salary. In a 2018 survey through NSBA, about 63% of school board members say they ran to improve local education and give back to their community. The common thread? A commitment to equity, accountability, and access.
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