1.

2 - Decision Making in Educational Systems

2.2.7 -- Identify how decisions are made in education systems

Decision-making is an integral part of achieving goals. Decision-making is also a

complicated process, because decisions that are made today determine success or

failure in the future. In this paper, I will identify how decisions are made in the education

system. There are three levels of entities that are vested in the decision making process

starting with the federal level. The federal level is the White House and Congress which

makes laws regarding public education. They also provide money down to the local

levels. The next level is the state level. The state level makes funding decisions for

individual districts. They have the common core funding and minimum state standards

that they use to make these decisions. The last level is the local level. The local level is

the school district. Within the local level, they follow state mandates (grade

requirements, class size) to manage school systems.

The federal government passes laws and acts to make the educational system

better for everyone. Here are a few moments that changed public education: the nation

at risk, No Child Left Behind, and also Race to the Top Program. Interested people can

find more moments/information on things that have changed public education on the

attached timeline (evidence 1.2.2). One example is Brown vs Board of Education. This

decision reversed Plessy versus Ferguson, ruling that separate is not equal and

outlawed segregation. The federal level made sure that everything was equal for all,

and that there were no differences between schools. (evidence 1.2.1)

 The state level adopts policies. State governments commonly delegate

responsibility for the accountability and operation of government- run schools to local

bodies.The state level makes funding decisions.The stakeholders that are a part of the

state level are the legislators, the state board of education, and the Ohio Department of

Education.They all work together to make sure everyone gets the funds that they need

in order to have everything within schools run correctly. They determine the amount of

funding they give to each school district by a set of variables including local tax rates,

exemptions, and overall affluence of the community. At the state level, they have to

make decisions based upon people's incomes to determine how much money they will

provide to specific districts. The Ohio Department of Education also publishes

recommended teaching standards, guidelines, strategies and materials.

The Local level consists of individual school districts. Each school district is

governed by a school board.The school board is elected by the public, by a mayor

and/or City Council. The school board has to bring their ideas to stakeholders in the

school district such as the superintendent and building principals. All of these people

work together. They use state mandates such as graduation requirements, class sizes,

calendar, and salaries to run the district. Currently, within the Olentangy Local School

District, they are trying to figure out how to open an additional elementary school

because of overcrowding. They are trying to make decisions on where the school

should be located, how it’s going to be paid for, and how the students will be

redistricted.. Together, the federal and state governments typically provide slightly more

than half of the school funding needed, but school boards are responsible for funding
the rest of their budget.They get the remainder of their money by collecting property

taxes on all of the homes and businesses within their district.

Within this essay I have talked about the decision making and different levels of

the process we go through to get the decisions that we want.You can get advantages in

all different ways depending on the decision that is trying to be made. Don't forget, when

trying to make decisions, try and find a way to say yes even if you know it is not

possible, still try to find a way to say yes.