Texas Superintendent Workforce

The University of Texas at Austin College of Education recently released a report — Untapped Talent: An 11-year Analysis of the Texas Superintendent Workforce.

The analysis spans the 2010-2011 to 2020-2021 school years and produced seven key findings describing the health of the state’s superintendent pipeline and how well it reflects state demographics.

The key findings are as follows:

• The Texas superintendent workforce does not reflect the state’s diverse student population, especially among Hispanics.
• The superintendency is slowly becoming more diverse, but the pace of change needs to increase, especially in rural areas.
• Despite some progress, women are still in the minority among superintendents, though they make up a large majority of teachers and principals.
• Women, Black, and Hispanic superintendents are more likely to serve in school districts with the highest amounts of poverty.
• High-poverty districts have the highest rates of superintendent turnover.
• Women, Black, and Hispanic leaders took longer, less direct paths to the superintendency.
• Women in the superintendency made less than men regardless of location, district size, or experience.

For an expanded discussion of the key findings, recommendations, a description of the study’s purpose, research questions, data, and methods, see the report Untapped Talent: An 11-year Analysis of the Texas Superintendent Workforce.