The Role of the State in Education.

The author addresses three questions: (1) How did states get into the education business in the first place? (2) How significant is the states' role? (3) What are the problems that are most critical--at the state level--and what can be done about them? The author traces the slow evolution of the state role in education up to the present where that state role is significant in the areas of leadership and regulation. The major problems are that educators tend to decry rather than understand the political process and, as a result, are ineffective spokesmen; that the states are not being heard by the federal government with respect to educational matters; that there is public disenchantment with education; and that there is a lack of coordinated planning. (Author/IRT)