How Not to Be a Terrible School Board Member
Lessons for School Administrators and Board Members
June 2012 | 160 pages | Corwin
How to Not Be a Terrible School Board Member is a practical guide both for how to become an effective school board member, and for how school administrators can improve their board relations. The intended audience is prospective, present, and past school board members and school administrators.While the overwhelming majority of school board members have good motives, even people with good motives can make bad moves, even terrible moves. This book is dedicated to preventing situations in which good intentions can lead to bad outcomes. The book takes a case based approach that focuses on terrible school board member moves as the fastest and most memorable way to help one learn how to be an effective school board member ,and to see, by contrast, how a successful school board member operates. Case-based learning is used in many professional programs such as business, law, medicine, and even teacher education, and research on learning by example has a strong and growing empirical research base.
Preface
About the Author
Acknowledgments
I. Terrible District teamwork
1. Humiliate a District Employee in Public
2. Negotiate in Public
3. Attack the Administration in Print
4. Micromanage the Superintendent
5. Never Question the Administration
6. Solicit Complaints from Teachers and Staff
7. Ask for Special Treatment
II. Terrible Board Teamwork
8. Disrespect a Fellow Board Member
9. Speak for the Board
10. Build Coalitions
11. Abstain on Tough Votes
12. Be Decisive, Don't Compromise
13. Come Unprepared to a Board Meeting
14. Do Too Much Homework
III. Terrible Public Relations
15. Represent Your Supporters
16. Minimize Public Input
17. Run Your Own District Survey
18. Argue with a Hostile Speaker
19. Confide in a Reporter
20. Garner Public Support
21. Sign a Petition
IV. Terrible Personal Style
22. Ignore Minor Conflicts of Interest
23. Take Political Stands
24. Use the District's Credit Card
25. Remember Your Political Party
26. Do a Favor
27. Accept Gifts
28. Radiate Negative Energy
Epilogue