Businessman and lawyer Joe Klein recently took control of New York
City's school system amidst a trend around the country for large
cities to place non-educators in the top education post.

Professor Dorothy Shipps of Teachers College, Columbia University,
spent several years studying Chicago schools where two consecutive
non-educators were hired by Mayor Daley to run the system.

"It's not intuitive, even for the best minds," said Shipps, who
believes that it takes professional experience and training to run
schools. "Management is also a profession. So it makes sense to
have managers do things like figure out how we fund the rebuilding
of schools, or get the best transportation system, or distribute
text books in the best possible way."

The article, entitled "Chancellor's Challenges" appeared in the
August 4th edition of Newsday.

When possible, the News Bureau provides a link to article summaries, a link is always provided to the online source. Not all online sources archive information and some charge a fee for older material.

Published Sunday, Sep. 15, 2002