By Leslie Collins
Northeast News
December 7, 2011

The Missouri Board of Education received more than 500 recommendations on how to proceed with the Kansas City Public Schools. Effective Jan. 1, KCPS will lose its accreditation.

Missouri Education Commissioner Chris Nicastro, along with Missouri Board of Education members, met in Branson, Mo., Dec. 2 to discuss the next steps for the district. Nicastro said the state has several governance options, which include a mayoral takeover, maintaining the status quo, a state appointed special advisory board, dissolving the district or appointing a special board to replace the elected board of education members. After weighing the options, the board voted to postpone its decision.

“Advancing a recommendation for governance or other intervention prior to the community reaching a consensus as to what this should look like would simply add to the dysfunction and prolong the disruption for children and for adults,” Nicastro said.

Mayor garners community input

While the state board continues to mull over options, some are hoping the board will choose the mayoral takeover proposed by Kansas City Mayor Sly James and a group of more than 30 community leaders. James organized nearly a month of meetings with stakeholders that included parents, legislators, teachers union representatives, education leaders, superintendents from area school districts, community and business leaders, among others. The group offered seven options which ranged from doing nothing to abolishing the district to subcontracting with adjoining districts. James submitted the proposals in a 14-page letter sent to Nicastro. Of the seven options, the group reached a consensus that a mayoral takeover would provide the best outcome.

“The continued failure of the Kansas City Missouri School District (KCMSD) to adequately educate every child in the district has enormous implications for the social and economic fabric of this city,” James wrote in his letter. “An undereducated populace directly correlates to increased crime, an underprepared workforce, and joblessness, all of which adversely impact the financial well-being of the community.”

That equates to fewer jobs and a greater dependence on social services and public assistance, he said.

“On a more basic and moral level, it is simply immoral for us to fail to do all that is necessary to prepare the children of this community to compete in what is clearly a complex global economy,” James said.

Mayoral takeover

James called a mayoral takeover a “bold plan” that the stakeholders don’t take lightly. In his letter, he pointed out that in the past 10 years, major cities across the U.S. have adopted a governance structure with mayoral leadership. Cities include New York, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, among others.

“We were at the point where if we did nothing, we knew certain legislators from outlying areas were going to introduce legislation to absorb the Kansas City School District and have a school board that wouldn’t have any local influence,” State Rep. John Rizzo said.

Rizzo was one of the legislators asked to join James’ group of stakeholders to brainstorm ideas.

“I’m very proud of the way the mayor has taken on this responsibility,” Rizzo said. “A lot of politicians in the past have really run from the Kansas City School District thinking that there wasn’t hope to fix it and that they would be caught in the crossfire of a failing school district and their political careers would be damaged.

“The mayor needs to be lauded for taking on this giant responsibility, which he did not have to do.”

Under the mayoral leadership model, which Rizzo favors, the mayor would oversee a three-member administrative team consisting of a chief executive officer (CEO), chief academic officer (CAO) and chief business officer (CBO). The mayor would select the CEO and the CEO would select the CAO and CBO with the consent of the mayor. In this scenario, the mayor would be the “primary source of accountability to the community.”

In his letter, James stressed he has “no personal agenda to satisfy.”

“I did not ask for this responsibility, but I will not shy away from it if this group, a cross section of our entire community, believes it is in the best interest of the children,” James wrote. “I am willing to play any role (or none) in order to achieve the single most important goal of ensuring academic achievement for the children of this city.”

Regardless of what option is chosen, Rizzo said turning around the school district will take time.

“The Kansas City School District has not been in a very good position or shape for quite a while, so it’s not going to be fixed overnight,” Rizzo said, “but we have begun the undertaking of drastic measures that need to happen in order to provide a good, quality education for our children.”