Urban School Boards Initiative
This initiative, funded by the BellSouth Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, and the Motorola Foundation focuses on two fundamental questions:
How can urban school boards facilitate improved student achievement? and
How will the boards themselves have to change to be effective?The three components of the Initiative are: (1) public opinion research to determine what actions the public would like to see its urban school board members take, (2) a roundtable meeting with national leaders to develop comprehensive strategies for improving urban school board effectiveness in light of the key challenges identified in the research, and (3) a comprehensive action agenda to inspire school board reform and design the strategies needed to make it happen. This component culminated in
Leadership Matters: Transforming Urban School Boards, which focuses on concrete strategies to help urban school boards become more effective in leading their districts to improve student achievement.