Although research
on professionalism
in state legislature
has been substantial, professionalism research
has ignored
legislative bodies
in local government,
such as city councils
and school boards.
Using detailed
school district-level data
and an original survey
of school board members in 210 school districts in California,
we develop measures of professionalism
in the local government context.
We then use these measures
to examine which characteristics
of school districts
are associated with greater professionalization.
Consistent
with findings
in the state politics literature,
we find that districts
with greater resources
and more heterogeneous environments
exhibit higher degrees
of professionalism than
other districts.