This article appears in print in the April 2018 issue. Click here to subscribe.

For more than a decade, Andre Helmstetter has been what’s known in education circles as a “stakeholder” in Seattle Public Schools. The father of three kids, ages 17, 13 and 5, and a two-time candidate for the Seattle School Board (in 2009 and 2017), Helmstetter is familiar with every aspect of the K–12 system and four superintendent regimes. As a business consultant in the “lean” process (a customer-centric business efficiency model) and a former volunteer chess coach at Leschi Elementary School, Helmstetter is used to thinking strategically about resources and taking the long view. And he thinks that’s exactly what Seattle hasn’t done with its school system.

“I haven’t seen anything change with any superintendent,” says Helmstetter. “Seattle has a ‘shiny object’ problem.”

Last October, the Seattle School Board indicated it would not be renewing Superintendent Larry Nyland’s contract when it expires in June 2018, instead opting to embark on a national search for a new leader. (At press time, the school board’s timeline called for a new superintendent to be announced in late March.)

Counting from what some consider Seattle schools’ Camelot era—the groundbreaking superintendency of John Stanford from 1995 to 1998, cut tragically short by his death—Seattle has had eight school chiefs in the past 20 years. The new leader will be Seattle’s third superintendent in six years. Although it’s common to hear people complain about the high turnover, a September 2014 study conducted by the Brookings Institution’s Brown Center on Education Policy suggests that, with an average superintendent tenure of three years, Seattle is mostly on par with other large urban school systems, where the average head of schools only stays for three or four years.

But that study, School Superintendents: Vital or Irrelevant?, doesn’t capture why superintendents leave their jobs, acknowledges one of its authors, Matthew Chingos, now a senior fellow and director of the Urban Institute’s Education Policy Program. It’s worth noting that nearly every Seattle school superintendent since Stanford has either been fired or resigned under a cloud.

In 2011, interim Superintendent Susan Enfield—who was expected to be offered the permanent job—stepped down amidst speculations that she was unable to work unfettered with the school board; she moved on to a job as superintendent of the Highline School District. Although her replacement, Superintendent Jose Banda (2012–2014), left to take a job in California, he had had several skirmishes with the board. The decision not to keep Nyland, who replaced Banda, was actually made in a closed executive school board session in late 2016. A year later, the school board publicly voted 5 to 2 not to renew his contract.

You don’t need to be a district stakeholder to notice that the Seattle School Board and its district superintendent often have a dysfunctional relationship. Those weary of so much turnover at the top would like to understand why.

A key factor associated with superintendent performance in Seattle is the large and persistent gap in student achievement and often, opportunity; that is, the differences in academic growth and success between students of color and low-income students and their white and more affluent counterparts, and the lack of equity in education paths among these groups.

School leaders are charged with providing more equitable means of success, but in Seattle, those leaders have failed to make adequate progress. Each November, Seattle releases its “District Scorecard,” which measures academics, commitment to equity, teacher effectiveness, school climate and stakeholder engagement and satisfaction. The 2016–17 scorecard, released last November, shows sustained and in some cases, growing gaps. Other King County districts with similar challenges, such as Highline, are making gains, which prompts people to question what’s wrong with Seattle.