United States
In the United States, public schools are run by school districts, which are independent special-purpose governments, or dependent school systems, which are under the control of state and local government. A school district is a legally separate body corporate and politic. School districts are local governments with powers similar to that of a town or a county including taxation and eminent domain, except in Virginia, whose school divisions have no taxing authority and must depend on another local government (county, city, or town) for funding. Its governing body, which is typically elected by direct popular vote but may be appointed by other governmental officials, is called a school board, board of trustees, board of education, school committee, or the like. This body appoints a superintendent, usually an experienced public school administrator, to function as the district's chief executive for carrying out day-to-day decisions and policy implementations. The school board may also exercise a quasi-judicial function in serious employee or student discipline matters.
Not all school systems constitute school districts as distinct bodies corporate. A few states have no school systems independent of county or municipal governments. One prominent example is Maryland, where all school systems are run at the county or, in the case of Baltimore City, the county-equivalent level. Other states, such as New York, have both independent school districts and school systems that are subordinate to cities. The Hawaii State Department of Education functions as a single state-wide school district. This is unique among the states, but the Puerto Rico Department of Education operates all schools in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, thus also functioning as a single school district.
In the 2002 Census of Governments, the United States Census Bureau enumerated the following numbers of school systems in the United States:
- 13,506 school district governments
- 178 state-dependent school systems
- 1,330 local-dependent school systems
- 1,196 education service agencies (agencies providing support services to public school systems)
School districts in the US have reduced the number of their employees by 3.3%, or 270 thousand between 2008 and 2012 .
Read more about this topic: School District
Famous quotes related to united states:
“The United States must be neutral in fact as well as in name.... We must be impartial in thought as well as in action ... a nation that neither sits in judgment upon others nor is disturbed in her own counsels and which keeps herself fit and free to do what is honest and disinterested and truly serviceable for the peace of the world.”
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)
“In the larger view the major forces of the depression now lie outside of the United States, and our recuperation has been retarded by the unwarranted degree of fear and apprehension created by these outside forces.”
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)
“I feel most at home in the United States, not because it is intrinsically a more interesting country, but because no one really belongs there any more than I do. We are all there together in its wholly excellent vacuum.”
—Wyndham Lewis (1882–1957)
“The United States is the only great nation whose government is operated without a budget. The fact is to be the more striking when it is considered that budgets and budget procedures are the outgrowth of democratic doctrines and have an important part in developing the modern constitutional rights.... The constitutional purpose of a budget is to make government responsive to public opinion and responsible for its acts.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)
“In the United States, it is now possible for a person eighteen years of age, female as well as male, to graduate from high school, college, or university without ever having cared for, or even held, a baby; without ever having comforted or assisted another human being who really needed help. . . . No society can long sustain itself unless its members have learned the sensitivities, motivations, and skills involved in assisting and caring for other human beings.”
—Urie Bronfenbrenner (b. 1917)