City Schools and City Politics: Institutions and Leadership in Pittsburgh, Boston, and St. Louis

by John Portz, Lana Stein, Robin R. Jones

Educational reform is one of the most critical issues facing our cities, but some cities are better at it than others. To explain why, this book relates education to politics, showing how the "whole village" can be mobilized to better educate tomorrow's citizens. City Schools and City Politics is based on an eleven-city NSF study of civic capacity and urban education. As participants in that study, the authors conducted research in three rustbelt cities that have lost much of their tax base and have legacies of machine politics. They analyzed the ways in which government, business, and community leaders create, or fail to create, civic support for public education, focusing on why certain cities show greater initiative than others in addressing these problems. The authors reveal that, of the cities examined, Pittsburgh has made the most strides in educational reform, followed by Boston, while St. Louis has consistently lagged behind. Their observations show that cross-sectorial coalitions are essential for bringing about change; that organizational arrangements in the business community and their relationship to local government affect whether there is the capacity to address school reform; that leadership is critical in bringing about change; and that municipal institutions and culture influence a city's ability to take action. Packed with empirical data and analysis, City Schools and City Politics demonstrates the citywide and long-term character of successful efforts to reform public schools, relating education to the priorities of municipal governments and describing the conditions under which reform becomes possible. It extends regime theory to public education and shows that education policy is inextricably linked with urban political life and is an issue of real concern to political science. This book is part of the Studies in Government and Public Policy series.

199 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 1999

Reviews

[Theresa Leone Davidson · Rating 3 out of 5]

City Schools is about education in large, urban cities. The authors conducted research in three cities that have lost much of their tax base and have legacies of machine politics. They analyzed the ways in which government, business, and community leaders create, or fail to create, civic support for public education, focusing on why certain cities show greater initiative than others in addressing these problems. According to them, Pittsburgh has made tremendous, positive growth when it comes to educational reform, Boston is somewhere in the middle, and St. Louis lags behind. They use a lot of statistics to back up their beliefs, and they offer some interesting theories, most of which I did not agree with but found interesting anyway. If you are at all interested in education in urban areas, give this a try.