The issue of school-based management, as a part of the numerous reform activities occurring during the late 1970s and 1980s, represents a somewhat radical departure from the traditional ways in which schools are perceived. That is, rather than proposing that schools should remain in centralized districts engendering uniformity of planning, budgeting, and staff functions, educators and researchers alike have called for reforms that bring much of the administrative activity to the local school site. In addition to these actors, parents and other community members have become more active in their lobbying efforts to have more autonomy made possible at the building level. At issue has been that the public schools have undergone widespread failure in their attempts to adequately educate students. There has also been reported widespread deterioration of student achievement, declining standards and expectations for student performance, and inadequate requirements for those in the teaching profession. Further, there has been considerable drop-out among secondary school students, an increasing flood of teachers leaving the teaching profession, and a rising number of strikes by teachers and other school staff. As well, there is currently an alarming increase underway of students at risk for a variety of reasons, numerous students are being denied equal opportunity to learn, and student preparation for the work-force is markedly less than what it should be. Further, the United States is steadily losing its competitive standing in the international community due for the most part to the inappreciable manner in which students are being educated. In essence, the governance of schools by the school board appears to have for the most part failed.
The response to this nationwide tragedy, school reform, has proposed numerous approaches to the ways in which the education system as a whole can be repaired. The use of school-site management i...