Sandra Lee Gupton EdD is Professor of Educational Leadership at the University of North Florida in Jacksonville Florida where she has been serving for the past six years as Chairperson of the Department of Curriculum and Instruction. Before coming to UNF she was Professor of Educational Leadership at the University of Southern Mississippi for eleven years. Her experiences before coming to higher education include more than twenty years in various positions in PreK–12 public schools including English and reading teacher high school principal director of instruction assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction and superintendent in Georgia and North Carolina schools. Sandra’s professional interests are centered on leadership issues related to PreK–12 and higher education leadership effectiveness gender equity program reform and school improvement. Her early research on gender equity in educational leadership led to many presentations the publication of several articles and the 1996 Corwin publication Highly Successful Women Administrators: The Inside Stories of How They Got There offering advice to prospective women administrators in education. Her research and writing in recent years have been focused on the role of academic chairpersons and leadership in higher education.
The under-representation of women in educational administration is addressed in this book. The experiences of 15 female educational leaders in their quest for, ascent to and acquisition of leadership positions are described. Through their experiences, the administrators also offer advice to other women and men in the profession. Important themes emerging from the book include: women's lack of aspiration to administrative positions; cultural stereotypes regarding gender roles and leadership; and insufficient support systems for and among women in educational leadership.
