ELECT STATE SCHOOL BOARD -- OR ITS CHIEF

House Republicans in Jefferson City announced their legislative proposals week before last, and one idea caught plenty of attention: scrapping the appointed state school board in favor of electing these officials. Under the GOP proposal, board members would run for office on partisan ballots in elections in each of the state's nine congressional districts. Missouri voters would have to endorse the proposed change in the state Constitution.

Good for the Republicans for kicking off this debate. We say that without even being sure that electing state school board members is the way to go. The real issue, however, is an unelected state schools commissioner who answers to an unelected state school board. That's two layers of unaccountability in our schools. Frustration is mounting with an arrogant and unaccountable state education bureaucracy that is ramming all kinds of bogus "reforms" down the throats of Missourians in what are, after all, our schools.

The current system of an unelected board hiring an unelected schools commissioner dates from the constitutional convention of 1945. In their wisdom, those folks decided that education was far too important to leave to the politicians, so they wanted it handed over to the "experts." Thus the current, insular system, wrapping all the chiefs of our state school bureaucracy in layer upon layer of unaccountability from ordinary Missourians.

It helps to know your history. The Constitution of 1945 was a departure from ancient practice in Missouri. For more than a century before that, Missourians had voted every four years for an elected superintendent of schools, just like governor, attorney general, secretary of state and all the other elected officials. Perhaps rather than electing school board members, we should go back to electing a schools commissioner. At least then, every four years, all Missourians would have a chance to listen to and participate in a debate over where our schools are heading. As things stand now, ordinary folks are just about totally shut out. The mandarins of Big Education in Missouri should climb down from their ivory towers, check their know-it-all air of superior knowledge at the door and eat some humble pie. They don't know it, but it's later than they think.