The School Board's Role in Student Achievement
School boards have an important role in improving student achievement. IASB defines that role through Leadership for Learning Standards. These standards are based on the Lighthouse research studies conducted by IASB’s research arm, the Iowa School Boards Foundation, along with other research on leadership and effective schools.
“The Lighthouse studies show that boards in high-achieving districts are very different from boards in low-achieving districts,” said Lisa Bartusek, IASB associate executive director for board leadership. “There’s some pretty clear evidence that if we want great gains in student learning, school boards must master their role as strong leaders for school improvement.”
School boards must master their role in:
Building clarity and commitment for high expectations in student learning: Includes the board’s role in developing mission, vision and beliefs; setting student learning expectations and improvement goals; communicating the moral imperative of improvement; and celebrating success and progress in improvement.
Ensuring adequate supports and resources to improve student learning: Covers prioritizing funding and human resources around student learning goals; ensuring that staff have the training and tools to be successful in improvement initiatives; and engaging legislators and the community to ensure adequate supports and commitment for improvement.
Holding the system accountable, not accepting less than high achievement for all students: Includes identifying indicators the board will accept as evidence of progress or success in improvement initiatives; monitoring the implementation, impact and cost of improvement initiatives; ensuring public accountability; and holding the superintendent accountable for improvement in student learning.
Embedding capacity for change in policy, planning and practice: Covers aligning policy, planning and practice to support instructional improvement; developing leadership throughout the school and community; and maintaining the focus on improvement over time, dealing with barriers as they arise.
Nurturing the board/superintendent team as leaders for improved learning: Includes committing board learning and agenda time to understanding school improvement; regularly evaluating the board around fulfilling its leadership and governance roles; and developing an interdependent leadership between the board and superintendent.
Understanding the instructional improvement core of district work that ensures student learning: While boards don’t do this work, they must understand the work of the superintendent and staff in instructional improvement. The board can’t perform its other roles of setting goals, providing supports or accountability without an understanding how effective schools operate. This “instructional core” work of staff includes distributed leadership; curriculum, instruction and assessment; instructional strategies; professional development; tracking implementation and results for students; and other work.
For more information, contact Mary Jane Vens at IASB, 1-800-795-4272.