Since the 1983 publication of A Nation at Risk, pressures for school improvement have buffeted US Public Schools. School reformers have focused considerable attention on the institutional structure of schools and school systems. Adopting school-based management (SBM), in which those closest to students make most educational decisions, is a change in institutional structure that holds the promise of instructional improvement. The expectation of SBM is that moving decisions to those closest to students, rather than those in the district central office, will improve student performance. This study examines the role of the central office in a system of schools with SBM. I examine the support services that one district's central office offers to a subset of its schools with SBM. School leaders are permitted discretion to buy these services from the central office, an outside vendor, or to receive the purchase cost of these services in cash to use in other ways within their respective schools. School leaders' decisions to purchase certain services and their opinions about services provide a window on the role of the central office in supporting schools.

This study is a case study of the shared service model in one district, Boston Public Schools, that established a subset of schools with SBM in 1995. Data was collected through qualitative interviews of participants throughout the school system (district officials, department heads, and SBM school leaders). A mini-case study of another district, Edmonton Public Schools, provides a comparison. Analysis of the data reveals that schools with SBM tend to not purchase services from the central office. If they have a need for a certain service, they prefer to provide it using internal resources. School leaders indicated that even though they would like more central office services to be discretionary, having certain central office services helps them by freeing up capacity and permitting them to focus on instruction. Moreover, being part of a district provides security and economic benefits of being part of a larger organization. To best support schools, the central office will need to reframe its services by altering its cultural, legal, financial and structural features.