This paper examines three recent studies of patterns of public participation in educational decision-making conducted by Peshkin, Schaffarzick, and Zeigler, briefly analyzing each study in terms of three models of public policy formation: (1) the traditional democratic or formal bureaucratic model, (2) the technological or empirical bureaucratic model, and (3) the democratic administration model. The author concludes that none of the communities studied by Peshkin, Zeigler, or Schaffarzick offer much hope for participatory democracy, and he therefore argues that more viable models for educational policy-formation must be developed. He then presents the Third-Party Problem-Solving Model, an arrangement where the function of continuous problem-solving is delegated by the school board to a representative group of citizens, educators, nonprofessional school employees, and students. (Author/JG)