This article analyses the disaggregated data from the 2020 American Superintendent Decennial Study. The focus on superintendents of colour provides important insight into the ways individuals holding the highest rank in school districts govern the instructional, facilities, fiscal, personnel, and community relations matters as they comprehensively…

Charol Shakeshaft and Margaret Grogan have just finished a book called "Women and Educational Leadership" for a leadership series published by Jossey-Bass. For those engaged in the preparation and development of school leaders, women's leadership is thus recognized along with Distributed Leadership, Turnaround Leadership, Ethical…

Purpose: This short essay aims to reflect on the global experiences women in education have had in becoming leaders as noted in the articles in this special issue on women's leadership. Design/methodology/approach: The essay draws upon relevant historical and contemporary literature about women in the professions and in the workforce. Findings:…

Most published research on the superintendency has failed to examine the voices of female superintendents. Today, white males make up approximately 85% of superintendents, rendering female responses to the superintendency almost non-existent. This study, commissioned by the American Association of School Administrators, provides a historical…

This article reports the two-year tenure of a woman superintendent in a small southern city. Placed against the background of local community politics and school district politics it shows that women in the superintendency still face issues of gender stereotyping that influence the way they are perceived as leaders of school systems. A feminist…

Considers the moral dimension of educational leadership, based on the lived experiences of 11 women superintendents. Examines interviewees' perceived options in resolving moral dilemmas that defy adherence to policy. Most evident is superintendents' reliance on localized knowledge of particular people, capacity to imagine the other's situation,…

This paper presents findings of a study that investigated the reasons why more women are not in the superintendency when there are many women who are qualified and interested. Using a feminist poststructural approach, the first phase of the research consisted of a pilot case study of four women aspiring to the superintendency. The second phase…

This poem is composed from the interview data of a participant in a qualitative study of what it means to be a woman superintendent. This representation captures the woman's rhythms, images, and metaphors. (SLD)

Critiquing two "Handbook" chapters on gender and race, this article observes that equity concerns have given way to concerns with quality and excellence. Both chapters explore reasons behind lack of equity (for poor students of color and women in school administration) and criticize "liberal" solutions to social problems.…

Amid reports of superintendent shortages and concerns about equal opportunity, what place do women superintendents occupy in today's school districts? Are they sought after or are they struggling to break into a traditionally male-dominated profession? What qualities, if any, do they bring to the office that may make them more desirable as…

Few superintendents of K-12 public school districts in the United States are women, though many women have leadership positions in schools. This book presents findings of a study that explored what it was like to be a qualified woman aspiring to the superintendency. Data were obtained from interviews with 27 self-identified women aspirants who…

Examines a woman superintendent's 2-year tenure in a small southern city from a feminist perspective. Against a backdrop of community/district politics, shows how gender stereotyping still influences how female superintendents are perceived as school-system leaders. Women must resist traditional images reserved for them and reinvent the…

This paper reports on data from a larger study of women being mentored into educational leadership positions in public schools, focusing on women's conflicts with leadership and how mentoring can help in dealing with such conflicts. The larger sample included 55 mentors and proteges in Washington, Maryland, and Virginia. This paper uses the…