HOW DO WOMEN SUPERINTENDENTS’ WAYS OF LEADING SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT SUPPORT TEACHING AND LEARNING?

Abstract

This dissertation examined how two women superintendents employed in rural school districts located in the Midwestern United States describe their leadership practices. Leadership theory suggests that women potentially adopt different approaches to leadership than their male counterparts. This qualitative study explored how these two women superintendents led their small, rural districts and therefore sought to document the barriers that they faced as they enacted their leadership in a setting that is predominately occupied by men. The thematic analysis produces three themes. First, the women superintendents adopted a relational leadership orientation as their primary leadership approach and used this approach to engage multiple stakeholder groups to achieve district goals, including those related to teaching and learning. Second, the women positioned themselves as connectors who create networks of trusting relationships with individuals and groups within their communities. They actively listened to constituents within their communities and focused many of their efforts on instructional improvement. Finally, their gender influenced how they interacted with stakeholders and prompted the superintendents to take actions that sought to mitigate the influence of gender on leadership practice. Notably, the women sought to prove themselves, share power, minimize their personal accomplishments, ignore criticism, and deflect gender-based jokes. The findings from this study have implications for the field of educational leadership and, more broadly, theories of leadership, which have only considered the role of gender in leadership action.