Can a Central Bureaucracy Reinvent Itself into a Market Maker?

Nearly one third of the students in the United States attend a school in a large urban school district. ¹ Large urban districts have poor average performance, low proficiency rates, significant achievement gaps between racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic groups, a reputation for resisting performance pressure in favor of the status quo, and some high-profile blunders. For these reasons, political theorists, mayors that control their school districts, and state policymakers with the support of philanthropic donors and the business community have sought to develop new institutional arrangements to address performance failures in large urban districts. ² Paul Hill’s portfolio strategy or portfolio management model (PMM), as it is referred to in the literature, is the most prominent and comprehensive attempt to address all of these issues simultaneously (Buckley 2010).