Campus Location
Dallas Campus (Online)
Date of Award
4-2022
ORCID
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2816-9196
Document Type
Dissertation
Department
Organizational Leadership
Degree Name
Doctor of Education
Committee Chair or Primary Advisor
Karan Duwe
Second Committee Member or Secondary Advisor
Mary Christopher
Third Committee Member or Committee Reader
Karmyn Downs
Abstract
The goal of this qualitative case study was to revisit Bandura’s agency, self-efficacy theory, and Kram’s mentor theory to address the disproportionality between the number of men and women superintendents in Texas. Despite extensive female representation in classrooms, campus leadership, and central office positions, the number of women superintendents remained relatively unchanged for nearly a decade. Access to mentors, leadership pipelines, career pathways, and other factors was examined to identify current and prior barriers to promotion. Semistructured interviews gathered reflections and experiences from the lens of seven current women superintendents and six mentors of women superintendents. Survey responses from women superintendents were also collected. Thematic coding of interviews facilitated the analysis of the data. Findings included the potential benefits of increasing agentic behaviors and self-efficacy through supportive mentoring relationships before and after women entered the superintendency.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Levy-David, Carmela Marisa, "Agency, Mentorship, and Self-Efficacy: Achieving Gender Equity Among Texas Superintendents" (2022). Digital Commons @ ACU, Electronic Theses and Dissertations. Paper 452.
https://digitalcommons.acu.edu/etd/452