Do We Need Big-City School Superintendents?

By Nathan Glazer

When three Washington-based research and consulting organizations, backed by five leading foundations, launched the "Superintendents Prepared'' program this year ("Foundations Seek To Expand Pool of City School Chiefs,'' Education Week, Feb. 5, 1992), I wonder whether they considered an alternative: abolishing the troubled office completely.

The article announcing the undertaking tells us that almost half the nation's urban school districts had superintendent vacancies in 1990, and that the average tenure for such chief executive officers is now about two and a half years. One response is of course that the situation in finding good and survivable big-city school superintendents has become desperate and requires drastic action; but another is to consider whether one needs the office altogether. Boston and New York, both cities I observe closely, have gone through a succession of superintendents in recent years. The two cities contribute to that average tenure of two and a half years. All of their superintendents have had, in some places, for some purposes, distinguished careers, and have then been chewed up, to no visible advantage to the school...