ATLANTA --- At the request of the state Board of Education, a coalition of business and education groups are putting together a task force that will take a broad look at how local school boards in Georgia operate.

While the immediate backdrop for the panel is the accreditation crisis in suburban Clayton County, leaders of the new effort say it was under way before Clayton's problems emerged and that the incident is not the only reason the task force is being assembled.

"It is a statewide problem," said Phil Jacobs, a retired AT&T and BellSouth executive who will help lead the panel.

In recent years, the Savannah-Chatham County and Glynn County school systems and a few other districts have spent time on probation with the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, the group responsible for accrediting schools in Georgia.

"But the situation in Clayton has certainly drawn attention to the need for greater oversight and better governance of school boards across Georgia, many of which are also struggling to maintain accreditation," Ed Heyes, the deputy managing partner of Deloitte & Touche LLP and chairman of the state chamber's education committee, wrote in an e-mail.

Mr. Jacobs said the last major overhaul to school-board governance in Georgia came in 1983, when the method for selecting members changed from appointments by grand juries to elections.

"There really hasn't been a comprehensive review since then," he said.