Boston Mayor Michelle Wu addresses a gathering in Boston, April 5.

Photo: Charles Krupa/Associated Press

Boston

Boston is a different city today than in 1974, when working-class whites rioted against a federal judge’s order to desegregate the schools via forced busing. Tribalism has been smoothed over by prosperity. In 2021, after decades of Irish and Italian mayors, voters put 36-year-old Michelle Wu in City Hall. The school system is now steaming with fervor for social justice. But one thing hasn’t changed: Boston still does a poor job of educating kids, especially the majority who are Hispanic and black.

Thanks to its universities, Boston brims with educational talent and good intentions. The $1.3 billion Boston Public Schools budget keeps expanding even as the student population shrinks. But the money buys failure. In September, Matt Hills, a member of the state Education Board, pricked some consciences by saying he was starting to feel “complicit” for not raising the possibility of receivership—a state takeover. Jeffrey Riley, the state education commissioner, then ordered a formal assessment of BPS—a prerequisite for receivership. Teams of observers have sat in on classes and talked to teachers, students and staff.

BPS has some good schools, but according to the state Education Department, a third of Boston’s students attend schools that are among the lowest-performing 10% in Massachusetts. Data from the nonprofit Boston Schools Fund show that barely 70% of BPS students (excluding those at exam-based schools) graduate from high school. Nobody knows the precise graduation rate because, as the Boston Globe has reported, BPS has misreported data for years.

Only 25% of black elementary schoolers test at grade level in English. According to a previous state review, before the pandemic, absenteeism was “staggering.” The schools are failing English learners and special-education students. The transportation system is a disgrace.

Mayor Wu, who took office in November, has pleaded for time to let BPS heal itself. A Harvard Law graduate and classically trained pianist, Ms. Wu recently told the Education Board, “No one is better equipped to accelerate the progress Boston has made than our Boston Public Schools communities.”

That is a point of contention. According to the state, “district-wide policies and systems are significant contributors to student underperformance.” BPS fails to provide adequate curriculum guidance; it fails to ensure that schools, which operate with autonomy, are held accountable; principal turnover is significant. Improvement projects sputter. The central office is inept. Six high school teams were booted from the state basketball tournament because BPS neglected to submit a form.

Blame, in part, a political culture that discourages accountability. A decade ago many local Democrats were reformers, but those of recent vintage have been unwilling to buck the Boston Teachers Union, which defends the status quo. BPS is dragged down further by institutional morass. The school superintendent formally reports to the Boston School Committee, but the mayor has traditionally exercised control of the system. No one has had the courage to shutter redundant facilities. BPS is seeking $49 million in the coming year to keep “underenrolled” schools open.

A state law that requires BPS to publicize the names of finalists for the superintendent job has the effect of discouraging applicants. Earlier this year, Superintendent Brenda Cassellius

said that by “mutual agreement” with Ms. Wu she will resign at the end of the school year, aggravating the sense of rudderlessness in the central office. Her successor will be the city’s fifth superintendent in eight years.

Many families have lost faith, a process accelerated by a 13-month Covid shutdown. In 1966 Boston schools served more than 100,000 kids. Enrollment now is under 50,000. Because of shifting demographics, BPS is more segregated than in the 1970s. Minorities are leaving, too. “We’re producing a product that people don’t want,” says Ernani DeAraujo, a former member of the Boston School Committee.

Lack of resources isn’t the problem. Boston has 7,000 fewer students today than it did five years ago, but it has managed to add 220 teachers and 150 administrators. The special-education budget is more than any other district in the state, save for the three largest, spends on everything. At $27,000, Boston’s annual per pupil spending is second only to New York City’s.

Yet Boston charter schools are among the best in the nation. According to the Boston Schools Fund, charters in the city graduate 90% of their students. But legislation limits spending on charters within each district. A referendum that would have led to more charters was defeated by a union-backed campaign. The teachers union also blocked more “pilot” schools, organized within BPS, that mimic charters.

The lure of receivership is that under a 2010 law signed by Democratic then-Gov.

Deval Patrick, a receiver would have broad power to increase teaching hours, override union contracts and make other reforms. Receivership would enable an education czar to bypass political and collective-bargaining constraints. That’s essentially what happened in Lawrence, Mass., a poor, mostly Hispanic city 30 miles north of Boston. After Lawrence entered receivership in 2011, scores rose considerably for math and moderately for English, and graduation rates improved. The receiver in Lawrence was Mr. Riley.

In two other Massachusetts cities, improvements in receivership have been less dramatic. Lawrence schools remain a ward of the state, and folks there are getting impatient. In Boston there is considerable opposition, from unions and others, to a takeover. Even Paul Reville, education secretary under Mr. Patrick, questions whether the state can run such a massive system.

BPS is already operating under a state memorandum of understanding that Ms. Cassellius signed in 2020. The memo requires Boston to make improvements at 34 schools the state has deemed “underperforming.” If the state determines that BPS isn’t making progress, Mr. Riley, a former middle-school principal, would be in a position to ask the board to approve an intervention. Republican Gov. Charlie Baker would likely support him, but the question for Mr. Riley is clear: In the world’s most educated city, can the state tolerate less than adequate schools?

Mr. Lowenstein is the author of “Ways and Means: Lincoln and His Cabinet and the Financing of the Civil War.”