Abstract

The role of school board policy as an instrument for empowering leadership is explored in this paper. Currently, the majority of policy handbooks are not designed to provide motivation or vision and are not part of an ongoing effort to create a congruence of district expectations. When policy becomes a statement of a school board's expectations and visions, rather than a tool for crisis management, it can serve as an instrument of leadership. For policy statements to become effective instruments of leadership and empowerment, they must be written to reflect the overall vision of the school board and participants. A conclusion is that to fulfill their roles, school boards, particularly those in rural communities, need to tak.. active leadership roles, one of which is policy formation. To achieve district goals, policy handbooks must be reviewed, reformulated, and rewritten so that they embody the goals and ideals shared by the board and its constituents and are written in terms of "superobjectives"--that is, objectives that go beyond the surface concerns which dominate the average policy handbook or guici and give coherence and meaning to the leader's performance. (LMI) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document.