Perdue pushes new reforms for state’s school boards

Gov. Sonny Perdue wants more power to remove school board members and tighter rules on who can serve on school boards to try to prevent another system from ending up like Clayton County’s schools.

On Tuesday, Perdue proposed a series of reforms to ensure public school boards have “responsible leadership” and to give the state the ability to intervene before a school system loses its accreditation, as Clayton’s system did last year.

“I have sat in that governor’s chair and watched the fallout from a dysfunctional school board undermine earnest teachers and their students … and it is heart-wrenching,” Perdue told legislators Tuesday morning.

“Never again do I intend for the state to be handcuffed by our current law and powerless to help students who are being failed by the adults in their community.”

The legislation is the first major reform proposed since Clayton County became the first school system in nearly 40 years to lose accreditation. On Aug. 28, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools revoked the 50,000-student district’s accreditation, citing a dysfunctional school board and other problems.

Many of Perdue’s requests mirror recommendations proposed by the Commission for School Board Excellence, a group of business and accreditation leaders that state officials asked to study Georgia’s education and school board governance laws and compare them to other states.

SACS’ president and chief executive officer Mark A. Elgart, a member of the commission for school board excellence, said the situation in Clayton might have been different if Perdue’s proposals had been in place last year.

“It provides a much stronger structure for school boards to be successful and effective. While there is no fail-safe, this enables the state and other agencies to provide greater support when a situation like this begins to emerge,” Elgart said. “This includes interventions that could have prevented it from getting to the point of the loss of accreditation.”

Perdue removed four Clayton board members several hours after SACS revoked the district’s accreditation. But the governor said he had wanted to be able to act months earlier, when the district began having troubles with its accreditation.

Perdue said he doesn’t want the state to have the authority to take over failing school systems, but wants to have more power to step in earlier in the process. His proposal would allow him to suspend board members and appoint new ones when a system is placed on probation or learns of accreditation problems.

“It will give the state the ability, not to take over schools, but to find responsible citizens to serve on school boards when the existing members fail to serve the interests of their students,” Perdue said.

The board members would have 30 days to appeal their removal to an administrative law judge. The removal process would only be applied to board members elected in 2010 or later, a spokesman for Perdue said.

Perdue’s legislation also would limit school boards to five to seven members; make all school board elections nonpartisan; require state education officials to provide ethics training for local board members and to develop an ethics policy for them to follow; require school board candidates to be registered voters with no judgments of mental incompetence; and clarify the roles of superintendents and board members.

Clayton school board chairwoman Alieka Anderson said she supports most of Perdue’s legislation, but is disappointed that Clayton continues to be used as an example of what not to do.

“We know people are looking at Clayton County, but we’re trying to do what’s right now,” said Anderson, who was elected in July. “We can’t dwell on the past. We have to move forward and try to regain accreditation, not just talk about what happened.”

Anderson said she is against the proposal to cap boards to five or seven seats. Clayton’s board now has nine members. “We need nine members. We need nine voices,” she said. “Hopefully we won’t lose anyone.”