The School Superintendent: Roles, Challenges, and Issues

State and Intermediate District Superintendents

Although the term school superintendent is most readily associated with local districts, the position also exists at two other levels of authority having jurisdiction over public education. One of them is the state government. The first state superintendent, appointed in New York in 1812, had three primary duties: plan a common school system for the state, report on the management of public funds, and provide school-related information to the [Page 143]state legislature. Over the next 40 years, every northern state and some southern states followed New York's lead in creating such a position (Butts & Cremin, 1953).

The creation of state departments was spawned by tensions between two basic and seemingly contradictory values, liberty and equality. The concept of local control, unique to the United States, is an expression of liberty; the intent was to allow residents of local school districts to participate in public school governance by influencing budget, curriculum, and personnel decisions. By the 1830s, however, state officials began to recognize that disparate educational opportunities existed among local schools. This perceived problem prompted them to embrace the common school concept. Spring (1994) identified this movement's three primary objectives as educating all children in a common schoolhouse, using schools as an instrument of government policy, and creating state agencies to control local schools.

Today, state-level superintendents are found in all 50 states.1 While the overall responsibility of this position is to oversee education from a statewide perspective, the titles2 and conditions surrounding the job certainly are not uniform. Variability exists in the following areas: method of selection (appointed versus elected); relationship to the state board of education (nonmember, nonvoting member, member, or chair); authority over the state board of education (high, moderate, or low); and required, desired, and actual qualifications (professional educators or noneducators). Despite such fundamental differences, the position of state superintendent focuses on several common purposes reflected in the activities of the Council of Chief State School Officers. This organization is composed of public officials who oversee elementary and secondary education in the states, U.S. extrastate jurisdictions (American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands), the District of Columbia, and the Department of Defense's education activities. The council's mission is divided into four general activities: strategic partnerships and advocacy, professional development and capacity building, school performance and student achievement, and data collection, research, and technical assistance.

...