Charles Ungerleider, Professor Emeritus, The University of British Columbia
[permission to reproduce granted if authorship is
acknowledged]
Newly elected school boards have
the opportunity to consider their legacies, but determining a board’s legacy is
no easy task.
The motivations of individual
candidates and the values that underpin them are what distinguishes one
candidate from another. Forging a common legacy often means subordinating one’s
individual values to the values of the collective. Some trustees believe that,
if they subordinate their values, they will betray the voters who elected them.
However, on a board whose members have disparate values, some subordination is
necessary or nothing of value will be accomplished.
It is also challenging for a
board to decide what specific difference it wants to make in addition
to its responsibilities under the school or education act and accompanying
regulations that are the board’s primary obligations. Such responsibilities
typically include improving student achievement, well-being, and outcomes, and making
decisions in the best interest of the district.
Three school trustees in San
Francisco were removed from office by the electorate in part, though it is difficult to tell exactly,
because they had focused on changing the names of schools when the district was trying to figure out how to
reopen schools safely during COVID. Some of the citizenry saw the focus on
school name change - instead of far more urgent matters - as an attempt to
establish the virtuousness of the trustees by calling attention to the flawed
behaviour of those after whom the schools were named.
It is difficult to make a
judgment from this vantage point. There was certainly a symbolic dimension to
the issue, but, as I have written in another blog, there
is potentially an educational dimension to changing school names as well. While
the distinction between symbol and substance can sometimes be murky, it seemed
to most of the recall voters that the priorities of the trustees removed from
office were misplaced or mistimed given the challenge of getting students back
in school.
School boards sometimes
neglect to ask whether they have the authority to do what they propose. A board
in Canada accepted and passed a motion “to support lowering the voting age.” School
boards do not have the authority to make decisions about requirements of that
kind. Considered more broadly, that motion was a form of advocacy, though not
one that was very effective. Because the motion was not accompanied by any
advocacy plan, I would put that motion in the symbolic category. The lack of
plan and follow up persuades me that the purpose of the motion was to signal
the trustees’ virtue to their constituents.
I don’t think virtue signaling is sufficient for most constituents. They want those whom they
support to produce substantive accomplishments, tangible improvements in
student achievement and well-being, prudent stewardship of the district’s
resources, etc. While it is difficult to reach agreement about what a board’s
legacy might be, it is worth the effort because it helps to prioritize what –
among the many things a board might do - what the board should do.
Forging a common legacy is
easiest when trustees can see beyond their own interests to the interests of
the institution for which they are stewards.