One of the major sticking points to reducing the influence of politics in public education in Mississippi has been the thorny issue of ridding the state’s public school system of elected superintendents.
Gov. Phil Bryant signed legislation into law this week making that practice a thing of the past.
We loved electing public officials in Mississippi. Always have. The old saw is we don’t elect dogcatchers in Mississippi, but most of us would be up for it if we had the choice. Our state’s history is peppered with arguments about elections and the finer points of which officials should be elected and by what means.
Since the state’s first constitution was drafted in 1817, Mississippians have been arguing over whether to appoint or elect judges – for one memorable example. In 1832, a constitutional convention fight erupted between three groups – the “aristocrats” who favored the appointment of all judges, the “half hogs” who wanted to elect some judges and have others appointed, and the “whole hogs” who wanted all judges elected.
History shows that the “whole hogs” won in 1832 and Mississippi has been electing judges ever since. Of the state’s current 545 judges from the Supreme Court to the Municipal Courts, only municipal judges are appointed.
But on the topic of electing or appointing Mississippi school superintendents, there are no “half-hogs” – constituents either passionately wanted to continue electing their superintendents or they just as passionately believe that electing superintendents is a political relic that shortchanges Mississippi’s schoolchildren.
In Mississippi’s 144 school districts, 55 of those districts are headed by elected superintendents and most of those are in rural county school districts. But there are large, urban district exceptions including populous DeSoto, Madison, Rankin and Lee counties.
Electing school superintendents makes the leadership of school districts a popularity contest and more to the point, limits the talent pool available to lead school districts to educators who live within the district. The point was made several times over the multi-year life of the fight to make Mississippi school superintendents appointive rather than elected that state voters never put those kinds of limits on the hiring of a football coach for the same school district.
No, the districts hired the best qualified coach who was interested in taking the job and hopefully the one with the best track record of success. Why should hiring school superintendents be any different?
Thankfully, with a united front of support from Bryant, Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves and House Speaker Philip Gunn, the Mississippi Legislature was in a position during this session to finally act on this archaic practice. All three made their support of appointive superintendent legislation known early in the 2016 session.
It’s an issue on which Mississippi is out-of-step with the rest of the country. In some 99 percent of the school districts in the U.S., school superintendents are appointed. There are about 150 elected superintendents nationwide and about 55 of them are from Mississippi.
Why does it matter? Accountability. Board-appointed superintendents can provide greater accountability, as they answer to the elected school board. If the superintendent is not meeting the standards established by the local board of education and the state, the board has the authority to take immediate action and seek a replacement for the betterment of the school system.
With elected superintendents, school boards don’t have that authority except in the most extreme circumstances. The elected superintendent is entitled to a four-year term even if his or her performance is unsatisfactory – at least that’s true without extreme intervention from the state Board of Education.
Appointing school superintendents is unlikely to absolutely remove politics from public education, but it would go a long way in that many qualified educators who have the abilities and the qualifications to lead Mississippi public school simply don’t have the stomach for the political hand-to-hand combat necessary to get elected.
But the elected superintendent system has long been credited the questionable hiring and firing practices as principals, teachers and others in the state’s school systems were perceived in many instances to having their employment decided by the political spoils system rather than by merit.
In addition, many African Americans see changing from elected to appointed superintendents as a threat to gains made by fellow African American school officials. That factor also influenced the legislative process and was a key pressure point for elected superintendents fighting to protect the status quo.
Mandating appointed school superintendents was a major victory for merit in the operation of Mississippi’s public school system and should be seen as a major victory of the 2016 legislative session.
(Sid Salter is a syndicated columnist. Contact him sidsalter@sidsalter.com)