Event versus process: Mayoral control's potential and limits as method to promote school-service collaborations

Although many acknowledge that out-of-school factors influence students, most governance systems create collaboration barriers among schools and other social services by removing education policy from other governments. One governance reform, mayoral control of schools, is partially based on assumptions that city executives can reduce partnership barriers if they have formal education policy authority. In two parts, this dissertation examines whether mayors in different education governance systems pursue school-service collaboration and whether formal powers afforded by governance change are most meaningful to collaborators. Part one suggests that mayors with legal education authority include schools and school-service collaboration in their agendas more frequently. Part two finds that although mayors in a mayoral control system better helped create political environments conducive to school-service partnership, they did not do so in ways reliant on their formal powers. While this study shows the important roles mayors can play when pursuing school-service collaboration, it does not find these roles rely on formal powers granted by governance reform.