Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to determine the differing ways in which nonprofit charter and traditional public school board members define the concept of accountability in the school or schools they oversee. The findings speak to the governing consequences of shifting oversight of public education from democratically elected bodies to unelected nonprofit governing boards. Design/methodology/approach - The authors use originally collected survey data from democratically elected school board members and nonprofit charter school board members in Minnesota to test for differences in how these two populations view accountability. Open-ended survey questions are coded according to a previously used accountability typology. Findings - The authors find that charter school board members are more likely than traditional public school board members to define accountability through high stakes testing as opposed to staff professionalization and bureaucratic systems. Originality/value - The results speak to the link between board governance structure and accountability in the public education sector, providing new understanding on the way in which non-elected charter school board members view their accountability function.