Public School Administration: Employing Thompson’s Structural Contingency Theory to Explain Public School Administrative Expenditures in Washington State

The purpose of this article is to explore the open systems characteristics of public schools by applying James D. Thompson’s contingency theory to the study of school district central administration expenditures in Washington State. In this analysis, contingency theory appears to offer a fairly good explanation for central administrative expenditures. The model indicates that administrative expenditures are a function of the organizational environment and the stability of resource providers. Stable organizational environments and consistent resource providers are associated with smaller school administration, due to the more limited need for substantial organizational buffering.