School Chief: Mayors Need Control of Urban Schools

Education Secretary Arne Duncan said Tuesday that mayors should take control of big-city school districts where academic performance is suffering.

Duncan said mayoral control provides the strong leadership and stability needed to overhaul urban schools.

Mayors run the schools in fewer than a dozen big cities; only seven have full control over management and operations. That includes Chicago, where Duncan headed the school system until joining the Obama administration.

Speaking at a forum with mayors and superintendents, Duncan promised to help more mayors take over.

"At the end of my tenure, if only seven mayors are in control, I think I will have failed," Duncan said.

He offered to do whatever he can to make the case. "I'll come to your cities," Duncan said. "I'll meet with your editorial boards. I'll talk with your business communities. I will be there."

Urban school superintendents generally last three years or less, Duncan noted. He acknowledged Baltimore schools chief Andres Alonso, asking how many superintendents the city had in the past 10 years. The answer was seven.

"And you wonder why school systems are struggling," Duncan said. "What business would run that way?"

After the forum, Duncan told The Associated Press that urban schools need someone who is accountable to voters and driving all of a city's resources behind children.

"Part of the reason urban education has struggled historically is you haven't had that leadership from the top," he said.

"Where you've seen real progress in the sense of innovation, guess what the common denominator is? Mayoral control," Duncan said.

It is unusual for a Cabinet secretary to weigh in on local matters. Yet Duncan has been emphatic on the subject , calling for mayoral takeover of Detroit public schools and for New York lawmakers to renew the law giving Mayor Michael Bloomberg control over his city's schools.

His position could make for an awkward exchange later this week — Duncan plans to speak Saturday in San Diego to the National School Boards Association, which represents local school boards that control districts across the country and opposes mayoral control.