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Abstract

This brief considers how closing the superintendent gender gap may contribute to the strengthening of early childhood education (ECE) leadership. Using data from a national survey of superintendents, we find that women are significantly more likely than men to prioritize prekindergarten (pre-K) initiatives, even after controlling for ECE background and training and district characteristics. These gender differences are amplified among leaders with early grades teaching or ECE training. Our findings highlight the value of diverse leadership and suggest that supporting women’s advancement to the superintendency could strengthen district-level ECE efforts.

Keywords

descriptive analysis early childhood leadership regression analyses women’s issues

Although persistent gender gaps remain, women are making steady inroads into the U.S. prekindergarten (pre-K) through 12th-grade public school superintendency, increasing from 25.9% of all superintendents in 2019–2020 to 29.2% in 2024–2025 (White & Jerman, 2025). Beyond the broad and compelling arguments for gender equality and the need to remove systemic barriers in the superintendency, research highlights the distinct strengths women superintendents offer. For example, compared to their male counterparts, women superintendents more often express a commitment to advocacy and equity (Grogan & Shakeshaft, 2011). In this brief, we explore another potential benefit of closing the superintendent gender gap: a stronger commitment to early childhood education (ECE) initiatives.

District leadership is essential for aligning broad ECE initiatives and policies with public school systems to support students’ learning and developmental experiences (Stein & Coburn, 2023). Despite increasing integration of ECE into public schools, the superintendents’ role in ECE initiatives remains underexplored. Moreover, ECE has been historically shaped by gendered norms that shape professional pathways, organizational structures, and resource allocation (McDonald et al., 2024; Sullivan et al., 2020). Given the gendered dynamics of the field of ECE—with early grades teachers being predominantly female and the superintendency largely male—examining the intersection of gender and superintendents’ ECE prioritization and beliefs offers important insights for policy, leadership, and future research.

Data

We draw on data from a national survey of public school district superintendents, distributed via the National Longitudinal Superintendent Database from May to August 2024. We received responses from 404 superintendents, yielding a 4% response rate—comparable to national surveys conducted by AASA, the School Superintendents Association, and studies of organizational elites (e.g., Kertzer & Renshon, 2022). As shown in Appendix Table A.1, available on the journal website, our sample did not differ significantly from the national population in terms of district size and most student demographics. Superintendents in districts with higher proportions of students receiving free or reduced-priced lunch were slightly overrepresented in our sample; superintendents in city districts and those who identify as Asian or Pacific Islander were slightly underrepresented.

As described in the Methodological Appendix (available on the journal website), we employ ordinary least squares (OLS) regression models to examine how superintendent gender and ECE experience are associated with perceptions of pre-K using five survey items rated on a 4-point Likert scale while controlling for district and superintendent characteristics. Survey items asked superintendents to indicate the extent to which they agreed that (a) pre-K is critical to their district’s educational success, (b) pre-K holds equal status to other grades, (c) all senior leadership team members value pre-K, (d) ECE is a top-three district initiative, and (e) Pre-K is a top strategic priority for the school board. We analyzed each question individually and also created a composite measure by summing responses to all five items.

Findings

Although women comprise 29% of all U.S. superintendents (White & Jerman, 2025), 36% of our respondents identified as women, suggesting that men may be less likely to engage in a survey focused on ECE. Additionally, although men make up 11% of early grades teachers¹ nationally (Schaeffer, 2024), 22% of our respondents who identified as men reported having early grades teaching experience. This suggests that men with early grades teaching experience may have been more likely respond to an ECE-focused survey. We also found gender differences in background experience: Compared to men, women superintendents reported significantly higher rates of early grade teaching experience and ECE training (see Figure 1).

Figure 1.

Proportion of superintendent survey respondents with experience and training in early childhood education, by gender.

As shown in Table 1, women superintendents had significantly higher perceptions of the importance of pre-K in their districts compared to men. Specifically, on our pre-K importance composite variable, women scored an average of 0.35 SD higher than men. For individual questions, women were significantly more likely than men to agree that (a) pre-K is critical to their district’s educational success, (b) ECE is a top-three district initiative, and (c) pre-K holds equal status to other grades. Importantly, these items all fall within the superintendent’s control. In contrast, gender was not predictive of responses to the two survey items that captured others’ beliefs and are less under the superintendent’s control: (a) whether pre-K is a top strategic priority for the school board and (b) whether senior leadership team members value pre-K.

Table 1

Associations Between Gender and ECE Importance Composite and Component Items, Including Variation by Training and Teaching Experiences in ECE

	Composite: Pre-K Importance in Standard Deviations	1	2	3	4	5
	Composite: Pre-K Importance in Standard Deviations	Pre-K Is Critical	Focused on Pre-K–3	Pre-K Is Grade	Leaders Agree on Pre-K	Top Board Priority
Women superintendents	0.35*	0.27**	0.30*	0.33*	0.18	0.18
Women with pre-K–3 teaching experience	0.59**
Women with no pre-K–3 teaching experience	0.33⁺
Women with high ECE training	0.36⁺
Women with low ECE training	0.19

Note. Outcomes for Models 1 through 5 range from 1 to 4, corresponding to strongly disagree to strongly agree, respectively, and are ordinary least squares models. For each coefficient, the reference category includes superintendents who identify as men and for the same subgroup. ECE = early childhood education; pre-K = prekindergarten.

p < .10. *p < .05. **p < .01.

We employed OLS regression to examine whether gender differences in support for ECE differed by ECE teaching and training. Among superintendents with early grades teaching experience, women scored 0.59 SD higher than men on our composite score—a larger gap than among those without such experience, where women scored 0.33 SD higher than men. A similar pattern emerged for ECE training: Among superintendents with high levels of ECE training, women scored 0.36 SD higher than men. Among those with lower ECE training levels, the gender gap narrowed to 0.19 SD, although the relationship was not statistically significant. Finally, although the sample sizes were relatively small, we find suggestive evidence that all women superintendents—those with or without ECE training or experience—prioritize ECE more than men, even men with ECE training or experience.

Implications

Superintendents are increasingly being called on to lead ECE programs as an integrated component of public schooling. We found that women superintendents were significantly more likely to prioritize ECE, suggesting that supporting women’s pathway to the superintendency may be a key strategy for strengthening ECE leadership at the district level.

Given that women remain underrepresented in the superintendency (White, 2023), these findings suggest that accelerating women’s advancement to district leadership positions could yield dual benefits: promoting gender equity in educational leadership while simultaneously strengthening ECE programming at scale. However, relying solely on growing women’s representation in the superintendency could be slow—at the current average annual rate of gender gap closure, gender parity in the U.S. superintendency will not happen until 2055 (White, 2025)—and counterproductive if it risks reinforcing gendered expectations about who should champion early learning.

Instead, these findings underscore the urgent need for comprehensive leadership development that both cultivate ECE expertise among all superintendent candidates and address systemic barriers that continue to limit women’s access to the superintendency. Leadership preparation programs must better equip all aspiring leaders to recognize and champion early learning as a foundation to student success and embrace the systems-level leadership required to support it effectively. This may include leadership preparation programs partnering with early childhood teacher preparation programs to provide aspiring leaders with valuable learning opportunities around fundamental ECE learning principles. At the same time, school boards and current superintendents must recognize the value in growing leaders with ECE experience. Initiatives like the AASA Early Learning Cohort is one promising program to build the capacity within district leadership.

This study contributes to a growing body of research that highlights the challenges and opportunities for effective leadership for ECE in public schools. Despite the importance of early learning, early childhood educators are least likely to pursue leadership positions (Little et al., 2025). However, this study is not causal, and thus, we cannot determine whether women are more likely to be hired into districts already prioritizing ECE or they elevate ECE as a strategic priority upon arrival. This raises important questions about potential selection bias that future research may consider. Without tenure data, we also cannot examine whether women prioritize ECE from the outset or develop that commitment over time.

We also do not suggest a biological explanation for our findings. Rather, the observed gender differences likely reflect the influence of socialization and lived experiences on leadership priorities. Notably, we observe higher prioritization of ECE among women superintendents, even among those without ECE backgrounds. This could indicate that experiences beyond classroom roles contribute to women’s leadership priorities. However, it is also possible that entrenched social stereotypes create pressure for women to emphasize ECE, potentially reifying social and cultural norms around women as caregivers. Deeper qualitative research is needed to understand the mechanisms driving women superintendents’ prioritization of ECE, including how identity, experience, and social context interact. Finally, although this study captures the stated priorities of superintendents, it does not assess how these priorities are translated into practice. Future research should explore how ECE leadership priorities translate into practice to better inform preparation program curriculum and supports that help all superintendents effectively prioritize and implement critical ECE initiatives.

Supplemental Material

sj-pdf-1-edr-10.3102_0013189X251399178 – Supplemental material for Case for Closing Superintendent Gender Gap: Pre-K Commitment

Supplemental material, sj-pdf-1-edr-10.3102_0013189X251399178 for Case for Closing Superintendent Gender Gap: Pre-K Commitment by Rachel S. White, Lauren C. McKenzie, Michael H. Little, Rachel Rowan and Timothy A. Drake in Educational Researcher

Footnotes

ORCID iDs

Rachel S. White

Lauren C. McKenzie

Michael H. Little

Rachel Rowan

Timothy A. Drake

Notes

Authors

RACHEL S. WHITE, PhD, is an associate professor of educational leadership and policy at University of Texas at Austin, George I. Sánchez Bldg, 1912 Speedway, Austin, TX 78705; rachel.white@austin.utexas.edu . Her research focuses on issues of power, voice, and diversity in K–12 education leadership, governance, and policy spaces.

LAUREN C. MCKENZIE, MEd, is a doctoral student at The University of Texas, Austin, Texas, George I. Sánchez Bldg, 1912 Speedway, Austin, TX 78705; lcmckenzie@utexas.edu . Her research focuses on early childhood education policy, with an emphasis on the implementation of mixed-delivery systems, cross-sector leadership, and the influence of philanthropy on early childhood initiatives.

MICHAEL H. LITTLE, PhD, is an associate professor of educational evaluation and policy analysis at North Carolina State University 3088 CTI, Campus Box 7801, Raleigh, NC 27695; mhlittle@ncsu.edu . His research focuses on how education systems can better support children’s transitions from pre-K to K–12 by developing leaders and structures that sustain early learning gains and promote equity.

RACHEL ROWAN, MSEd, is a doctoral candidate in educational leadership, policy, and human development at North Carolina State University, Raleigh, 3088 CTI, Campus Box 7801, Raleigh, NC 27695; rrowan@ncsu.edu . Her research concentrates on pre-K leadership, district systems that facilitate early learning, and the ways teachers and school leaders support school readiness policies and public pre-K programs.

TIMOTHY A. DRAKE, PhD, is an associate professor of education leadership and policy at North Carolina State University, 3088 CTI, Campus Box 7801, Raleigh, NC 27695; tadrake@ncsu.edu . His research focuses on the policies, practices, and environments that shape school leader effectiveness.

References

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Supplementary Material

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