SECTION 210:10-1-7. Board(s) of education

(a)   The Oklahoma School Code in part, provides that each school district shall be a body corporate and shall possess the usual powers of a corporation for public purposes and it may sue and be sued and be capable of contracting and being contracted with and holding such real and personal estate as it may come into possession of as authorized by law. It further provides that the governing board of each school district in Oklahoma is designated to be known as the board of education of such district, and that the superintendent of schools appointed and employed by such board shall be the executive officer of said board and shall perform such duties as said board directs. These sections of the School Code emphasize the legal responsibilities of the board of education for the acts or business transacted by the school district and its responsibility of outlining, defining, and fixing the sphere within which its superintendent is to perform the assigned duties.

(b)   Each responsibility mentioned elsewhere for the superintendent legally is a responsibility delegated by the board of education. Hence the first and most important responsibility of the board of education is a complete and comprehensive set of written policies giving the framework of authority assigned to its executive officer, the superintendent of schools. It is proper practice for the board of education to grant authority to its executive officer to represent it during the interim between board meetings on routine business management problems which can be handled within established policies.

(c)   A person serving on a board of education should remember that he/she is only another citizen in the school district except when the governing board of the school district is in a regular or special meeting for the purpose of transacting business for the school district. Again he/she should remember that as a member of the board of education while it is in a meeting transacting the district's business he/she participates in determining the board's judgment but when the board as such adjourns he/she reverts to his/her status as a citizen of the school district and all acts of the board should be referred to by him/her as "the board of education in its meeting made this decision" without reference to persons or individuals who happen to be members of such board.

(d)   If a board of education has not prescribed and written down its policies for its executive officer, then a point of departure would be to require the superintendent to furnish the leadership and secure the necessary consultative service to perfect such policies as would be sound in nature and functional for the management and operation of the district's business.

[Authority: 70 O.S., § 5-105 (Boards of Education)]