The new chairman of the SRC

Newly sworn-in School Reform Commission Chairman Bill Green is getting tired of being placed on the psychiatrist's couch.

Even before Gov. Corbett announced Green was his pick, columnists, activists, pols, and educators have been diagnosing the potential ills of a Green-led SRC.

There's been talk not just of his policy preferences, but of his temperament and style, his ambition and motivations. The worry is that Green is too divisive, too pushy, too ostentatiously superior to balm the grievous wounds of the School District of Philadelphia.

If he is to succeed, conventional wisdom holds, Green will have to change. A lot.

Well, good luck with that.

I've covered Green for years, and he is not one of those public figures who sheds his skin to emerge as someone new and different whenever public whim or private pressure demands.

"I'm very proud of my record on City Council," Green tells me, ticking off what is indisputably a lengthy and impressive list of legislative accomplishments. "And I did that by being who I am. I want to continue to be successful, and trying to change who I am is not going to help with that."

But is he a good fit for SRC chairman?

Green is a high-risk, high-reward pick for one of the most demanding and important jobs in Philadelphia.

It is not hard to imagine a Green chairmanship that is stormy, counterproductive, and potentially brief. Green can be impatient, he does not suffer fools, and he is likely to be utterly unmoved by anecdote; even when it comes in the form of tearful parents or enraged teachers. (If you want to influence his thinking, bring a lot of data when making your argument, or be ready to challenge the validity of the figures and evidence he cites.)

But it's just as plausible that those very same traits - and others - will enable a Green-led SRC to break through the fiscal, cultural, and contractual logjams that have thwarted so many efforts to improve education at city schools.

It's fair to say that Green wasn't particularly well loved on Council. It's also fair to say that Green was one of the most productive Council members in recent city history. The point is that Green has managed, on many occasions, to persuade people who don't like him all that well to follow his plan.

On matters of policy, Green's views are usually firmly held and - he would argue - well-grounded in data and evidence.

But firm is not quite the same as immovable. Green welcomes meaningful argument, indeed he relishes it, and he can be persuaded to change his mind. For parent activists who crave genuine engagement with the SRC, and not just kindly brush-offs, Green may be a pleasant surprise.

"If we make decisions they don't like, they won't be able to say I didn't meet with them, I didn't give them time to have meaningful input, I didn't engage," Green says. "I've got to take all that off the table."

Another worry swirling around Green is that he will be incapable of letting Superintendent William R. Hite Jr. run the schools, inserting himself into operational matters where the SRC really ought not go.

Green rejects this. "I think I will be less activist and intrusive than previous chairmen," he said. "What we're going to do is agree on standards and then get out of the way until it is time to hold the district accountable to those standards."

That doesn't mean Green will be a low-profile chair. Quite the opposite. He sees himself playing a big role - "Dr. Hite's lead blocker" - in the public debate on schools. "My job is to be the biggest advocate for whatever the district needs, whether it's in negotiations with the teachers union, or a resource conversation, or a political conversation about the school code," Green says.

In that role, I expect Green to be a potent force, just as he was on Council. Green is the first former elected official to serve on the SRC, and he sees that as a big asset.

"Understanding what it takes to get real commitments to get things done, as opposed to just getting a good meeting; that's a skill set that is probably very desirable in that office," Green says.

I also expect Green to be an independent chairman. He's on record saying he won't make Corbett look bad, but if the two disagree on what's best for the schools, Green is just not well-equipped to bite his tongue for long.

The Public School Notebook reported Thursday that Green's bid for chairman was bolstered by a professional lobbying campaign mounted by the Philadelphia School Partnership, a school-choice advocacy group. Some may assume, then, that Green will be doing PSP's bidding. But the idea that Green would enact any agenda he hasn't fully embraced is hard to swallow. It's just not in his nature.

And Green's nature isn't changing.