A recent op-ed in the New York Times examined whether the Mayor’s office in New York City should retain its control over education policy by appointing the school board "The Panel on Education Policy". Despite the opinion piece showing that, among other things, NYC performance on assessments, graduation, and real-world readiness is worse than in cities where there is no mayoral control of schools, the U.S. Secretary of Education wants mayors around the nation to take control of public schools in order to make reforms.
Could that happen in Pittsburgh? For certain, the idea of getting the City’s government involved with education is not new. Two examples spring to mind. We wrote about a proposal in 2002 to add appointed members to the elected members to create a "hybrid" school board and the current Mayor was heavily involved in the Pittsburgh Promise as a way of making the City schools attractive and as an overall urban renewal strategy.
But it is doubtful that Pittsburgh would see the formal modification that would bring City schools under Mayoral control. It would take an action of the General Assembly to make it happen, and there has been little mention of such a possibility since the 2002 idea mentioned above. It would be better for the City’s top official to do as our most recent Brief advises-to use the office as an "agent of change" and promote competition and solutions that focus on parental choice and accountability. Decades of spending more and more certainly have not brightened the fortunes of the City schools, or, by extension, the City itself.
