Imagine if the board of directors of a corporation was banned from observing his or her own company's assembly line.

Of if the owner of a pro sports team was locked out of the locker room..

Or on a local level, if the county Board of Supervisors wasn't allowed to inspect the Hudson Falls trash plant, or if the Glens Falls Common Council was prohibited from going behind the scenes at the Civic Center.

Ridiculous, right?

If people are going to make informed decisions about the organizations they administer, then it's important that they have complete access to all parts of the operation, including the ability to observe workers firsthand as they're performing their jobs.

An organization should be an open book to the people who directly control the money and make personnel and program decisions.

Yet that basic principle of direct oversight apparently doesn't apply to our educational system.

In the Warrensburg school district, and apparently in school districts across the state, the elected members of the school board are either banned from going into classrooms and observing the educational process in action, or they have to get specific permission from the employees' union to do so.

School boards are responsible not only for decisions affecting the education of our children, but they also administer multimillion-dollar budgets that make up the largest portion of our local property tax bills.

Yet, if they want to see for themselves exactly how that money is being spent, the very districts they oversee throw up roadblocks.

School board members, as elected representatives, are the eyes and ears of the general public into the school system.

They should be granted the ultimate back-stage pass -- carte blanche to any aspect of the school operation they wish, any time they wish -- from observing teachers while they're teaching to counting the boxes of tissues in the storage room.

They shouldn't need a reason. And they shouldn't need permission from anybody.

What's the downside? That teachers might be a little nervous being observed?

One or two people standing in the back of a classroom shouldn't unnerve any competent teacher.

And anyway, in Warrensburg, three teachers actually invited the school board member to observe them. It was the teachers union that raised a fuss. Why is that?

It practically takes an act of God to remove a poorly performing teacher from the classroom.

And principals and superintendents regularly observe teachers in the classroom as part of their daily oversight function.

Why should the elected officials who are setting the policies and paying the bills have to get special permission to do the same thing?

Could one of those anti-tax advocates on the school board, during one of these visits, get some ammunition to propose cuts or eliminate wasteful spending? Maybe. But is that a bad thing for taxpayers to have someone raising such issues?

And school board members aren't the only ones who have a stake in the operation of schools. So do parents..

You certainly don't want groups of adults crowding into classrooms every day, for practical and security reasons.

But if the occasional parent wants to see what goes on in his or her child's classroom, why shouldn't that be encouraged?

And if a large number of citizens or board members want to see, for instance, what they're doing in gym class these days, then schools can either designate a place where they can all watch, or set up video cameras so visitors can observe the operation later.

School districts should not only allow board of education members full access to the schools, they should invite and encourage such visits.

Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, in support of open and accessible government, said that "sunlight is the best disinfectant".

If shining light on our schools will help bring about a better education for our children, then no one should have any reason to object.

Local editorials represent the opinion of The Post-Star editorial board, which consists of Publisher Rona Rahlf, Editor Ken Tingley and Editorial Page Editor Mark Mahoney.