Tale of Two Roles

Baltimore

Five-and-a-half years ago, against the advice of his wife and his academic colleagues, Samuel C. Stringfield stepped out of his ivory tower. The then-50-year-old education researcher, a nationally known expert on school improvement, became a member of the Baltimore city school board.

It was a gesture born of three things—public-spiritedness, a desire to translate research knowledge into practice, and intellectual curiosity. In the process, though, Stringfield became an overseer of one of the historically most troubled urban school districts in the nation. Over the course of his board tenure, the 89,000-student school system saw its rock- bottom test scores creep up, and it faced down fiscal insolvency and a possible state takeover.

At one painful point, protesters even swarmed into the school board meeting room, took over members’ seats, and...