The guy gave the worst convocation speech I’ve ever heard. Granted, I haven’t heard that many, but in 1980, when Boston University’s pugnacious President John Silber addressed the student body at one of New England’s major research universities, he certainly wasn’t aiming for eloquence. Instead, he rambled on condescendingly, reminding the students to be sure to clean the hair from the shower drains and -- in a most unfortunate choice of words -- to “not commit suicide” by inadvertently walking in front of one of the Commonwealth Avenue trolleys.

It was tough love, Silber style.

I thought about Silber’s speech this week after reading an article in Bostonia, the university’s alumni magazine, about the 20th anniversary of BU’s unprecedented -- and, so far, unrepeated -- management agreement with the Chelsea public schools.

Say what you will about Silber’s negatives, he had the imagination and chutzpa to take on the project after Harvard refused. The man I so loathed as a BU grad student put the university’s reputation on the line for a small urban school system with a host of problems -- crumbling infrastructure; a highly transient, immigrant population; high poverty; and abysmal test scores. And if, early on, Silber and the district’s new management team were criticized for their “czarist tendencies,” well, maybe the place needed a little tough love.

Did it work? As the Chelsea School Committee prepares to take control again after two decades, Bostonia makes the case that it largely did. BU revamped the schools’ curriculum. It consolidated and improved early childhood programs. It provided student teachers though the university’s education school, opened a health clinic at Chelsea High School, and provided free dental screenings through its School of Dental Medicine. BU also created a foundation that has raised $12 million for the schools, and perhaps most importantly, used its influence to help secure $116 million for school construction, most of it state money.

Test scores are climbing. The proportion of 10th graders passing the math section of Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System Tests (MCAS) rose from 10 percent in 1998 to 37 percent in last year; in English, the passing rate rose from 19 percent to 42 percent. Yet in many subject tests, Chelsea schools still rank near the bottom of the state’s urban districts.

The Chelsea School Committee could have ended the partnership years ago; instead it voted twice to extend the original 10-year agreement. The BU experiment illustrates both the successes and the continuing challenges of urban school reform. And while the university isn’t going away -- it will maintain some ties with the district -- building on its reforms will now be the responsibility of the local school committee.

Lawrence Hardy, Senior Editor