Boston is not alone. At least 17 of the nation’s biggest urban school systems - from Hartford to Houston, Washington to St. Louis, Detroit to Milwaukee - are searching for new superintendents. As cities increasingly look to education to solve a host of urgent problems that the school system was never designed to combat, the tenure of its stewards is dwindling. The average is half what it was less than a decade ago - little more than a two-and-a-half-year pit stop. Milwaukee Superintendent Robert Peterkin, who will resign this year to head Harvard’s new Urban Superintendents Program, says school chiefs are victimized by a “hero-the-first-year, goat-the-third-year syndrome.” Inevitably, the school board slays the goat and goes looking for a new hero.

But even a superhero would find it difficult to navigate the political waters. Boston, for example, has a 13-member board, and each member faces re-election every two years. More than half the board turned over during Wilson’s four-and-a-half-year tenure. Kansas City, too, is looking after having run through seven school chiefs since 1972. Its choice will have to satisfy not only a nine-member board, but also a 13-member Desegregation Monitoring Committee established by the federal court. “There are good candidates out there, but they need some assurance that they’re not walking into a revolving-door situation,” says Richard Miller, executive director of the American Association of School Administrators (AASA). But what is an assurance worth from a board likely to change its mind or its membership every few years?

Moreover, the job itself isn’t as gratifying as it once was. With virtually every city financially strapped, the schools are being asked to do more with less. “There’s no job satisfaction when all you do is cut, cut, cut,” says Peter Greer, dean of Boston University’s School of Education and a former superintendent in Portland, Maine. To make those cuts, a school chief faces endless meetings with countless constituencies followed by battles with board members, unions and, as Greer puts it, “a lot of people who feel you’re overpaid anyway.” San Francisco Superintendent Ramon Cortines finds himself consumed with complex problems - from asbestos to earthquake preparedness - that have little to do with education. He plans to resign this year with two years left on his contract.

Cortines admits he was never trained for the modern superintendent’s job. Nor were the people working for him. The average age of his administrators is 53. Because of union and tenure considerations, new school superintendents are denied a luxury that football coaches take for granted - that of bringing in their own staff. “The school boards want everything fixed, but the only change they make is at the top,” says Ken Underwood, a headhunter for school boards. “How can you ever change an entire bureaucratic structure with just one person?”

You can’t, says Charles Willie, professor of education and urban studies at Harvard, until the school-reform movement begins focusing on the policymakers. In stead of schooling administrators in pedagogy and curriculum development, he believes training in conflict resolution and community power structures would be more useful. Peterkin says Harvard’s new program will teach some of these practical skills using case studies and internships in urban systems. This will prepare the budding young school administrators for the frustrating paralysis they will face in their new jobs. “The ability to be a risk taker is greatly reduced,” says the AASA’s Miller. “The feeling is, screw up one thing and you won’t be given a second chance.”

Boston’s Wilson, despite decent grades from the board on most educational objectives, was viewed as lacking “communication skills.” The financially strapped system ponied up $260,000 to buy out his contract, which had another 16 months to run. That was a bargain compared with Houston, where it cost $425,000 to remove Joan Raymond, whom the board deemed “arrogant and autocratic.” George Garcia resigned in Kansas City after three years and countless clashes over court-ordered desegregation. Nobody explained why Cecil Carter was dumped this past fall in Savannah, Ga., just two years into his tenure; one evening the board went into executive session, and the next day Carter was out. Greer said he knew it was time to leave Portland when he saw the “Greer’s Got to Go” pickets - “and these were my friends. "

Little wonder that despite the prospects of six-figure salaries and considerable fringe benefits (in Boston’s case, untenured Harvard faculty status is being dangled for the first time), candidates are not lining up for these jobs. Milwaukee’s Peterkin says he is “shocked by the paucity of qualified candidates. " Last summer Detroit allotted eight months to find a new school boss. Its school-board president now terms that “an extremely ambitious schedule.”

Another factor complicating the searches is pressure from minority groups to select minority candidates. Few doubt that a minority school chief provides a good role model for minority students. But Willie points out that an obligatory minority choice may backfire on the minority community. Too often the new superintendent assumes its support and doesn’t bother to forge alliances there. “The minorities wind up feeling betrayed,” Willie says. “But the school board’s attitude is, ‘You got what you wanted. Now don’t bother us’.”

At the very least, hiring a minority superintendent is no panacea, and firing one can be very difficult. In Miami, where Hispanics outnumber blacks by more than 2 to 1, the Dade County School Board passed over Tee Greer, a black veteran of 31 years in the system who twice had filled in as interim superintendent, for 39-year-old Cuban-American Octavio Visiedo. Miami’s black community, stunned and outraged, organized a one-day school boycott. In Washington, there was an ugly confrontation between protesters and board members after Andrew Jenkins, a 30-year veteran of the D.C. system, was fired. Jenkins charges that his dismissal, in just his third year on the job, was racially motivated - despite the fact that blacks hold eight of the 11 seats on the school board.

Samuel Husk, executive director of the Council of Great City Schools, which represents 47 large urban districts, says school boards must learn patience. “When a board and superintendent can stay together for the long haul, you often see results,” he says. Richard Wallace was a controversial choice back in 1980 when Pittsburgh plucked him out of Fitchburg, Mass. Wallace survived a few stormy years, and Pittsburgh’s system is now regarded as one of the nation’s most innovative. Graham Down, executive director of the Council for Basic Education, believes administrators are forced to waste too much time currying favor with board members. “The whole essence of school boards has to be rethought,” he says. The Boston City Council certainly agrees. Last, month it voted to abolish the elected school board and place the mayor in charge of the schools, though it is unlikely the state legislature will approve the measure.

But that solution hardly places the schools above politics. In a few crisis-plagued systems, the school boards have actually been superseded. The State of New Jersey seized control of Jersey City’s schools. And in tiny Chelsea, Mass., just outside Boston, a desperate school board gave up control to professional educators from Boston University. That experiment, in its second year, has shown some promise. Few elected officials, though, have the courage to relinquish power. Instead, all those school boards now looking for new superintendents will eventually find someone willing to take the job - and the inevitable fall.

Incumbent fired with two years left on contract.

$147,000

194,000

New superintendent will be eighth since 1972.

$95,000

58,000

Four superintendents in the last decade.

$95,000

35,000

Andrew Jenkins was fired after just 29 months.

$85,000

81,000