ADMINISTRATIVE PATTERNS AND PROCESSES IN ONTARIO SCHOOL BOARDS

The research reported in this paper focusses upon the following concern: the participants and procedures followed by the central office of boards of education in Ontario in the process of making policy decisions; the size of the central office staff responsible for administering the edcuational system; the changes that have occurred in the organizational structures of school boards in the past ten years. Twelve boards were selected taking into account such variables as size, type, structure, language, urbanization and location. Within each board, the director, the senior business official, and at least one supervisory officer were interviewed. In addition, directors' reports to governmental and professional agencies were analyzed. The findings illustrate that the complex, delicate process of “making policy” proceeds through a series of stages during which the influence of key actors shifts. Boards with a medium number of students enrolled were found still to have the lowest number of administrators—a pattern noted earlier by Hickcox. Finally, it is suggested that the delivery of education has undergone much experimentation, adaptation, and change during the 1970s and while the description of the administrative structure of boards developed earlier still tends to hold, it may also mask significant organizational configurations that have developed more recently.