Who Owns the Public Schools?

“To me, a public school is a public trust. It doesn’t belong to the students who are currently enrolled in it or their parents or to the teachers who currently teach in it. All of them are part of the school community, and that community needs to collaborate to make the school better for everyone. Together, they should be able to redesign or create or discontinue programs and services. But collaboration is not the same as ownership. The school belongs to the public, to the commonwealth. It belongs to everyone who ever attended it (and their parents) and to future generations. It is part of the public patrimony, not an asset that can be closed or privatized by its current constituents.”

Who “owns” a public facility?

My assumption is that the public owns it, not the consumers or patrons or the users at a given time. The public paid for it, built it, and owns it.

But how can anyone change it for the better?