An overview of American schools

An overview of American schools, including the impact of America's changing demographics, will be presented. The structure of American schools, from the local to the federal level, will show that schools systems are bureaucracies within bureaucracies. Local school boards, superintendents, teachers, students, and community members all are part of what is called the American system of education.

The local school district as an autonomous entity is the basic building block upon which public education in America is founded. The system of allowing local governance of education goes back to the "little red schoolhouse" tradition of local communities educating their young people in the manner they thought best. As American society moved from an agrarian to an industrial base, the state gradually assumed more control of local school operations. In recent decades, the federal government has assumed a more encompassing role in its issuance of mandates, regulations, and guidelines regarding how education should be governed by the states. In short, the little red school house is now governed by the state capitol, and the state capitol is regulated by the Congress. Such is the bureaucratic buildup in a capsule form.

Today, the public schools of the United States are administered by 50 state systems and more than 10,000 local school districts. This plan stands in marked contrast to the administrative systems of countries that have all public education directed by a national min

ently in the 1990s. Only if administrative recommendations have faculty support will programs have a chance at survival (the tenure system is alive and well). In other words, it is of the utmost importance that the administrator have the support of his or her staff. The following excerpt outlines the lines of authority in the public school system, and reveals the characteristics of all bureaucracies: In the traditional school organization there is almost complete separation of planning and performance. The plans are the work of the superintendents, associate superintendents, and principals, who send their instructions down the line of authority to the teachers and pupils. In recent years there has been a shift away from the traditional line-and-staff organization and toward cooperative group-learning schemes. The central ideas in the reformation are to substitute leadership for authority and to implement participatory group study and decision in policy formation on the part of teachers, parents, and pupils. (Grolier Electronic Publishing, 1995, "Democracy and Educational Administration) As the above passage indicates, site-based management, through which administrators, teachers, parents, and pupils, collaborate on what

Category: Government - A