Women's Access to School Superintendency Roles

Women's Access to School Superintendency Roles PDF Author: Dana Solomon
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 130

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Book Description
Men continue to outnumber women in public school superintendent roles by a 4:1 ratio. However, women outnumber men by a 4:1 ratio in teaching roles in public school districts. In addition, more women than men hold superintendent certificates and educational doctorates. Due to this puzzling discrepancy, it is important to understand possible factors in the form of gendered barriers to access that could lead to the unequal representation of women in superintendent positions. In this study, I examined how these barriers manifested in the experiences of female superintendents participating in the study, how they influenced the hiring experiences of these participants, and how they impacted these female leaders throughout their careers. With this study, I investigated barriers associated with holding mechanisms, gendered norms, and gendered filters that may limit women's access to superintendent roles. Women's experiences of the origins and effects of gender normative perceptions and hiring practices have potential for contributing to the study of gender equity in the field of education and beyond. Findings could provide implications for increasing women's opportunities to serve beyond central office positions in public school districts. Possibilities exist for identifying practices in organizations that have hired women to serve at the highest level of school district leadership; that of the superintendent of schools.

Women's Access to School Superintendency Roles

Women's Access to School Superintendency Roles PDF Author: Dana Solomon
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 130

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Book Description
Men continue to outnumber women in public school superintendent roles by a 4:1 ratio. However, women outnumber men by a 4:1 ratio in teaching roles in public school districts. In addition, more women than men hold superintendent certificates and educational doctorates. Due to this puzzling discrepancy, it is important to understand possible factors in the form of gendered barriers to access that could lead to the unequal representation of women in superintendent positions. In this study, I examined how these barriers manifested in the experiences of female superintendents participating in the study, how they influenced the hiring experiences of these participants, and how they impacted these female leaders throughout their careers. With this study, I investigated barriers associated with holding mechanisms, gendered norms, and gendered filters that may limit women's access to superintendent roles. Women's experiences of the origins and effects of gender normative perceptions and hiring practices have potential for contributing to the study of gender equity in the field of education and beyond. Findings could provide implications for increasing women's opportunities to serve beyond central office positions in public school districts. Possibilities exist for identifying practices in organizations that have hired women to serve at the highest level of school district leadership; that of the superintendent of schools.

Voices of Women Aspiring to the Superintendency

Voices of Women Aspiring to the Superintendency PDF Author: Margaret Grogan
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 1438405111
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 236

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Book Description
The superintendency offers the most powerful and prestigious positions in K–12 public school systems. Few superintendents of these systems in the United States are women, although the majority of teachers are women and many women have leadership positions in schools. There are also increasing numbers of women in administrative preparation programs at institutions of higher education. This study of 27 highly qualified women in top-level administrative positions in public education was designed to find out what it is like to be a woman aspiring to the executive leadership position. Research questions included: Why are there so few women superintendents when so many are qualified? What are the routes to the superintendency? What is the context of educational administration in the public school? What kinds of leaders are women who aspire to the superintendency? The research was also informed by a femininst advocacy of social change to discover how and under what conditions a more equitable distribution of superintendencies is likely to occur. A feminist poststructural framework provided the theoretical basis for the analysis of the data.

Destined to Rule the Schools

Destined to Rule the Schools PDF Author: Jackie M. Blount
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 9780791496916
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 268

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Book Description
Winner of the 1998 American Educational Studies Association Critics' Choice Titles In 1909, when she became the superintendent of the Chicago schools, Ella Flagg Young proclaimed that women were "destined to rule the schools of every city." After all, women accounted for nearly eighty percent of all teachers by 1910 and their ascendance into formal school leadership positions could not be far behind. After World War II, however, a backlash against single women educators and a rigid realignment of gender roles in schools contributed to a rapid decline of women school administrators across the country, a decline from which there has been little recovery to the present. Destined to Rule the Schools tells the story of women and school leadership in America from the common school era to the present. In a broad sense, it offers an historical account of how teaching became women's work and the school superintendency men's. Blount explores how power in school employment has been structured unequally by gender. It focuses on the superintendency because an important component of the effort to establish control of schools has occurred in contesting the definition of this position. Unique and important contributions of this volume include: the only published comprehensive statistical study describing the number of women superintendents throughout the twentieth century, an analysis suggesting that the superintendency may have become an appointive position in part to remove it from the influence of newly enfranchised women voters, a discussion of the role of homophobia in creating and perpetuating rigid gender divisions in school employment, and a broad analysis that integrates the histories of teaching and school administration.

Women's Access to the Superintendency

Women's Access to the Superintendency PDF Author: Julie Marie Powell
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Discrimination
Languages : en
Pages : 120

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Book Description
The purpose of this research was to describe the experiences of six women superintendents who began their careers as elementary principals. The central question was: What can we learn from the lived experience of women who came from a background as elementary educators and advanced to the superintendency in a variety of district contexts within Michigan's traditional public school system? The research design was a qualitative, interpretive, multiple case study approach using the data collection method of interviewing. Two conceptual frameworks - expectations states theory and feminist poststructuralism - provided the context for this research. Portraits of each of the six participants were shared to provide detailed descriptions. Four emergent themes common across all six participants were revealed. Those findings were: 1. All subjects got initiated to the idea of obtaining administrative positions through an external event and/or person of influence who instilled in them a belief about their potential as an administrator; 2. Most considered their elementary backgrounds as an advantage to their beliefs and strengths as a leader, which developed into understanding how the K-12 system works for students; 3. All participants raised the issue of the challenge of relating to secondary teachers - the steep learning curve around scheduling and staffing and also learning about a secondary climate and culture - as needed to be successful as superintendents coming from an elementary background; 4. In seeking or accepting a superintendency, there was a significant draw to a home district or region with family ties. In addition to these common themes, it was found that the timing of a woman's decision to apply for a superintendent position was dependent on certain variables lining up at the right moment. There was also a strong appreciation and desire for mentorship for women as they decide to enter administration and move along their career paths. Several recommendations resulted from the findings of this study, including ones for women aspirants to the superintendency, university preparation programs, and search firm consultants and school board members. These recommendations addressed the need to purposively study women's issues in leadership to further understand how women make decisions about their career paths.

Sacred Dreams

Sacred Dreams PDF Author: C. Cryss Brunner
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 0791497860
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 252

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Book Description
Although women have dominated the teaching ranks at all levels of education since the turn of the century, men occupy 93 percent of superintendency jobs. Considering the nationwide concern that superintendency positions will be vacated faster than they can be filled during the next decade, it's quite possible that women are the greatest untapped pool of capable candidates. As women think about, seek, and accept superintendency assignments, they need a resource like Sacred Dreams that offers both practical advice from those who have attained this rank and research results from those who have studied the situation. Such an understanding has the potential not only to increase the number of women in the position, but also to increase their likelihood of success. [Contributors include Judy A. Alston, Cynthia Beekley, Jackie M. Blount, C. Cryss Brunner, Susan Chase, Margaret Grogan, Barbara L. Jackson, Debra Jackson, Estelle Kamler, Sylvia E. Méndez-Morse, Flora Ida Ortiz, Barbara Nelson Pavan, Charol Shakeshaft, and Marilyn Tallerico. Also included is a foreword by Patricia A. Schmuck.]

Breaking the Glass Ceiling from the Top

Breaking the Glass Ceiling from the Top PDF Author: Carolyn Ann Ritz Zachry
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 282

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Book Description


Women and Educational Leadership

Women and Educational Leadership PDF Author: Margaret Grogan
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0470933496
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 144

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Book Description
This groundbreaking book presents a new way of looking at leadership that is anchored in research on women leaders in education. The authors examine how successful women in education lead and offer suggestions and ideas for developing and honing these exemplary leadership practices. Women and Educational Leadership shows how the qualities that characterize women's approaches to leadership differ from traditional approaches?whether the traditional leader is a woman or a man. The authors reveal that women leaders are more collaborative by nature and demonstrate a commitment to social justice. They tend to bring an instructional focus to leadership, include spiritual dimensions in their work, and strive for balance between the personal and professional. This important book offers a new model of leadership that shifts away from the traditional heroic notion of leadership to the collective account of leadership that focuses on leadership for a specific purpose—like social justice. The authors include illustrative examples of leaders who have brought diverse groups to work toward common ground. They also show how leadership is a way to facilitate and support the work of organizational members. The ideas and suggestions presented throughout the book can help the next generation fulfill the promise of a new tradition of leadership. Women and Educational Leadership is part of the Jossey-Bass Leadership Library in Education series.

The Relationship Between Career Development Factors and Women's Access to the Superintendency

The Relationship Between Career Development Factors and Women's Access to the Superintendency PDF Author: Yonglyun Kim
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 444

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African American Women Accessing the School Superintendency

African American Women Accessing the School Superintendency PDF Author: Elnora M. Rowan
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : African American women school superintendents
Languages : en
Pages : 466

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Book Description
This study investigated from a Black feminist standpoint, through qualitative inquiry, the race and gender related barriers reported by African American women as they attempt to access the superintendency. Following in the footsteps of their sisters, African American women superintendents are defying the odds and overcoming a long history that began in slavery (Jackson, 1999). Because of the small number of Black female school superintendents, the move from the "outsider within" status to beyond the glass ceilings and then up the "crystal stairs" is an almost impossible one. Such a move requires that Black women be treated as a group unto itself and that Black women be viewed as a group unto itself through a Black feminist lens (Alston, 1999). Black women superintendents bring to educational leadership a strong commitment to and high expectation for improved student outcomes (Venable, 1995, cited in Brunner, 1999, p. 87), and their collective and individual voices are significant (Alston, 1999). This study used semi-structured interviews to gather information from African American female public school superintendents related to the following primary research questions: (1) What impact do African American female superintendents perceive sexism had on them as they accessed the superintendency? (2) To what extent do African American female superintendents report utilizing the strategy of "shifting" as a psychological tool in their quest for the superintendency? (3) To what extent do African American female superintendents report that institutional racism has hindered them as they accessed the superintendency? (4) How do African American female superintendents report that they have been impacted by societal norms regarding the unsuitability of women for powerful administrative positions such as the superintendency? (5) What kinds of positions did the African American female superintendents hold prior to becoming superintendents? (6) How do African American female superintendents perceive the problems which arise from assumptions made about their professional competence and personal capabilities, based on dominant culture stereotypes about African American females? (7) To what extent do African American female superintendents attribute their professional accomplishments to the successful adoption of the White male model of success? The interviews were audio-taped and later transcribed. Responses for each interview question were compiled and coded to identify common themes. The major findings were reported for each research question, conclusions were drawn and appropriate recommendations for research and educational practice were derived. The four major conclusions were: (1) Many African American superintendents experienced gender bias as they attempted to access the superintendency. (2) African American females utilized the strategy of "shifting" as they attempted to access the superintendency. (3) African American females experienced institutional racism as they attempted to access the superintendency. (4) White male mentors are instrumental in helping African American females access the superintendency.

Some Characteristics of Access to the School Superintendency for Men and Women

Some Characteristics of Access to the School Superintendency for Men and Women PDF Author: Janice Grow Maienza
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : School superintendents
Languages : en
Pages : 580

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Book Description