Improving student outcomes trumps personal agendas in Tuscaloosa City Schools’ school board. Its superintendent attributes its success to a culture of trust and cohesion.
“They know their role is vision, mission, policy and budget,” says Dr. Mike Daria, the district’s superintendent. “If they ever kind of get out of that lane, they either individually push themselves back into the right lane or they’ll do it with each other.”
The board recently earned the world’s first certification recommendation from Cognia, a global accrediting organization. Cognia cited unification and strong collaboration among board members with a consistent focus on student success, equity and continuous improvement.
“The board trusts each other and they work as a unified body,” Daria says. “I think they wanted to get confirmation that they’re doing the right work the right way as a governing body.”
According to , the certification process requires boards to meet a set of standards in four areas:
- Culture of learning: School board creates a broad and welcoming culture, inclusive of stakeholder feedback and focused on improving learning.
- Leadership for learning:Members understand their role in effective governance and oversight of the district’s strategic direction. They ensure long-term financial stability and set policies that align with governmental and legal requirements.
- Engagement of learning: Supporting open communication with staff, community members and policymakers to ensure varied perspectives are considered and partnershipssupport the institutions mission.
- Growth in learning:Using academic and non-academic data to make decisions that improve each learners performanceand experience.
Tuscaloosa City’s board is a clear example of an effectively run school board, says Dr. Andre Harrison, deputy chief of accreditation at Cognia.
Tuscaloosa City was a lot of things right, even before the certification rolled out, based on some of the evidence that we saw from a board meeting in 2023,” Harrison says. “They were so in line with the expectations, even before they saw what the observation looked like.”
Building a culture
Culture is strengthened when board members care more about students than their own political aspirations, says school board chair Eric Wilson, who credits Daria with cementing this mindset.
“When you hire the correct superintendent and you approve good hires by him, you trust one another and you trust your superintendent, and it allows you to stay in your lane,” Wilson explains.
Tuscaloosa’s work reflects a national shift toward more unified boards. During the height of the pandemic, frequently reported heated exchanges between boards and superintendents about critical race theory, sex and gender in schools and other controversial topics.
Boards are less polarized in 2026. Members now prioritize school quality over political issues, an suggests.
Seven officials on the eight-member board have served nearly two terms together. The trust they have built smoothed the onboarding of the newest member.
Daria also urges superintendents to invest time in getting to know new members and understanding their values.
“When the new board member came in, he really assimilated into those expectations of how you govern in a healthy way, where we just trust each other and handle our conflicts together when we disagree,” Daria says.
For instance, the board experienced rare disagreement recently when discussing whether to renovate or demolish an old school building.
“For us, it’s just keeping our finger on what we’re here for, what’s most important, and figuring out a way to get there through a lot of internal communication and hearing perspectives and changing our own,” he says. “I may have a great idea, but when I get perspective, I realize that’s either not a good idea or not the right time.”
91心頭+: Cultivating a board that sticks to its vision starts with knowing where the relationship stands. 91心頭+ members can use our Superintendent-Board Relations Assessment to find out. New members can start a .
