K-12 Leadership Equality

Equality Among the Ranks

If 72 percent of all K-12 educators in the United States are female, why are only 14.5 percent of school superintendents women?

Today, just 1,984 out of 13,728 district leaders are women. While that is a significant improvement from the early 1990s when that number was just 6.6 percent, there is still no clear understanding of why women have been so slow to move into these positions.  

Is it discrimination, based on public perceptions and misguided stereotypes of women lacking leadership skills? Could it be difficulty accessing traditional career paths as a high school teacher and principal? Or is it a personal choice, given the high demands on time?

“It is important that decisions about something we value as highly as the education of our children be made equally by women and men, and that women play an equal part in the creation and organization of schools where children can learn and thrive,” says Jill Sperandio, associate professor of educational leadership. “More women in the superintendency are needed to make this a reality.”

Pennsylvania has done better than the national average, where women make up 26 percent of the state’s 501 superintendents. Despite that, women at a recent Women’s Caucus of the Pennsylvania Association of School Administrators reported ongoing gender insensitivity and stereotyping from male-dominated school boards, among other professional and familial concerns.

Sperandio is studying those drawbacks and their impact on the leadership growth of women in Pennsylvania’s school districts. She is drawing on the experience of Louise Donohue, a professor of practice at Lehigh and retired superintendent of a school district in eastern Pennsylvania.

Their findings show that a large number of school districts in the state may make it easier for women to apply for positions without having to relocate their families, often an inhibiting factor for women aspiring to a higher-level position.

“Other results suggest that some districts are more ‘women friendly’ than others, offering women opportunities to gain administrative experience at all levels. They regularly appoint women superintendents,” says Sperandio.