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  • Threats, stress and politics pushing school superintendents out the door

    Threats, stress and politics pushing school superintendents out the door


    Former Temecula Valley Unified Superintendent Jodi McClay mouths “thank you” to the supporting crowd at Temecula Valley High School on June 13, the night she was fired.

    Credit: Anjali Sharif-Paul/MediaNews Group/The Sun via Getty Images

    The number of California school superintendents leaving their jobs is climbing, despite increased salaries and benefits. Some have reached retirement age or are moving to less stressful jobs. Some are being pushed out by newly elected school board majorities. A new crop of less experienced district leaders is taking their place. 

    Superintendent turnover in California grew from 11.7% after the 2019-20 school year, to 20.9% after the 2020-21 school year. Just over 18% left after the 2021-22 school year, said Rachel S. White, an assistant professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, who runs a research lab that collects data about school superintendents. 

    Turnover is particularly high this year because many superintendents who stuck it out during pandemic school closures, and the tumultuous years since, have had enough, White said.

    “This year, before the 2023 school year, I think people finally broke,” she said.

    Chris Evans, 52, decided to step down as superintendent of Natomas Unified in Sacramento at the end of last school year. He stayed on to help the new superintendent transition.

    “The job was always hard to begin with, and it’s become infinitely harder,” said Evans, who led the district for 11 years.

    “There are a number of folks in their 50s and 60s who are saying they are done,” he said.

    Pandemic made top job more difficult

    Superintendents’ jobs changed dramatically after the pandemic closed schools in March 2020. Instead of focusing on academics, strategic planning, school finances and community relations, superintendents were charged with navigating pandemic mandates and negotiating these changes with district unions. Superintendents also were tasked with ensuring there were enough computers and connectivity for students and staff to support virtual learning, all while dealing with parents who were angry their children were not in school.

    The reopening of schools did little to turn down the heat at school board meetings, which were politicized over issues such as the teaching of critical race theory and its tenets of systemic racism, and LGBTQ+ topics. School superintendents often found themselves the focus of community and parental ire — so much that some school districts paid for security for their superintendent.

    I can’t ever remember hearing of a superintendent that had gotten a death threat before. Now, I know personally four or five.

    Gregory Franklin

    Gregory Franklin, the former superintendent of Tustin Unified School District in Orange County, said he has never been threatened, but he knows other superintendents who have.

    “I can’t ever remember hearing of a superintendent that had gotten a death threat before,” said Franklin, who left Tustin Unified at the end of 2021 for another job. “Now, I know personally four or five. It’s just kind of shocking. So, I think, all of that being said, that when other possibilities present themselves, people are taking them.”

    Job turnover is a national problem

    The superintendent turnover problem is not California’s alone, according to the Superintendent Research Project. Nearly half of the country’s 500 largest school districts have changed leadership or are undergoing leadership changes since the pandemic began in March 2020. The study compared the two years before the pandemic to the first two years of the pandemic and found a 46% increase in superintendent turnover nationally.

    “What we are seeing is that the challenges are greater than ever before and the political environment is creating great instability in the institution, which is resulting in shorter tenure for superintendents,” said Dennis Smith, managing search partner for Leadership Associates, a recruitment agency that does many of the superintendent searches in California.

    Superintendents needed: many openings

    California school districts searching for superintendents include Sacramento City Unified, Eureka City Schools, Palm Springs Unified, Eastside Union, Pasadena Unified, Pajaro Valley Unified, Pacific Grove Unified, Culver City Unified, Newman-Crows Landing Unified, Solana Beach School District, Culver City Unified, Dixon Unified, Millbrae Elementary, Woodlake Unified, Hillsborough City, Merced City, Black Oak Mine Unified, North Monterey Unified and Dos Palos-Oro Loma Joint Unified. 

    The California School Boards Association projected a superintendent shortage five years ago, said Susan Heredia, CSBA past president. It began as baby boomers started to retire, she said.

    In the 15 months since Brett McFadden began work as a deputy superintendent at the Monterey County Office of Education, a quarter of the county’s 24 school districts have changed superintendents, he said.  McFadden was the Nevada Joint Union High School District superintendent until last school year.

    “If you look at the last 100 superintendents that had to leave their positions or their districts, you would be very hard-pressed to find any one of them that left because of test scores or left because of educational issues,” McFadden said. “They leave because of local politics, board relations, labor relations, a facility bond matter or a budget thing.”

    McFadden calls the Covid-19 pandemic the kindling that ignited the rise in single-issue adult-driven disputes, like those around masking and vaccinations, at school board meetings. 

    Demand is so high for superintendents that McFadden is already getting calls from search firms hoping to entice him to apply for jobs.

    “You know the paint on the door isn’t even dry yet with my name on it,” he said. “These search firms are now just aggressively looking for candidates.”

    Of the 30 candidates that apply for each candidate search, maybe eight to 10 meet the district’s qualifications, Evans said. Of those, there are only maybe three or four that could potentially be hired for the job, he said. 

    The high demand is driving up salaries and benefits packages, with total compensation surpassing the $500,000 mark in some cases.

    Firings making applicants wary

    Another factor pushing superintendents out the door is board members elected with the promise of firing the incumbent. The election of school board members who are determined to make significant changes in school districts has resulted in the firing of an unprecedented number of superintendents since the pandemic began in 2020, Smith said.

    The school board meetings, broadcast live, have been watched throughout the state — especially by other superintendents. 

    McFadden remembers watching Pajaro Valley Unified school board meetings in 2021 when the board fired Superintendent Michelle Rodriguez without notice and then reinstated her days later after a public uproar. Rodriguez left to lead the Stockton Unified School District this year.

    “You’d expect this in a Spanish novella or something, but you don’t expect it in your neighboring district,” he said.

    School boards can waive state credential requirement

    School boards largely determine the qualifications required for a superintendent in their district. Although the state of California requires school district superintendents to have both a teaching credential and an administrative credential, the school board can waive the credential requirement.

    At least six California school district superintendents did not have both a teaching and administrative credential in the 2022-23 school year, according to data reported to the state. The districts that waived the requirement that year included Visalia Unified, Los Angeles Unified, Mountain View Whisman Unified, Sacramento City Unified, Kingsburg Joint Union High School District and San Marino Unified, according to the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing.

    Since there is no mandate to report this information in CALPADS, the state data system, there could be more superintendents without both credentials, said Anita Fitzhugh, California teaching credential commission spokesperson.

    Superintendents are watching these meetings and paying more attention than ever to whether they fit well with the community of the district before they apply for a job, said White, of the University of Tennessee.

    “I think it’s just a heightened awareness right now,” White said. “Especially if I’m going to pick up and move my entire family and start a position in a new place. I don’t want to be fired in two years.”

    Temecula Valley Unified has been a hotbed of controversy since a trio of conservative trustees took control of the board a year ago. The board fired Superintendent Jodi McClay in June and banned the teaching of critical race theory, passed a parental policy requiring staff to notify parents if students are transgender and removed social studies material because it included a section on LGBTQ+ rights activist Harvey Milk. 

    Although the search for a candidate ended on Nov. 13 with the hiring of Gary Woods, a former Beverly Hills Unified superintendent, the search firm indicated to one board member that there were fewer candidates than in the past. Quite a few candidates did not meet the requirements outlined by the district in a job description and some weren’t even from the education field, board member Allison Barclay told EdSource in early November.

    “I would assume that if you’re looking for a position anywhere, any company, any school district, you’re really going to look at what the situation is you’re walking into financially, culture-wise, all of those things,” Barclay said. “And so, having a school district that is making national news is probably not appealing to as many people as might be attracted to it when it wasn’t making national news and was just simply known as an award-winning school district. So, I can’t imagine that that’s been helpful.”

    State legislators responded to the spate of firings by passing a bill creating a cooling-off period, prohibiting school boards from firing a superintendent or assistant superintendent within 30 days of new board members being seated or recalled.

    The law also prevents school boards from firing school leaders at special or emergency board meetings, which require only 24 hours’ notice, instead of at a regular meeting, which requires the public to be informed of a meeting at least 72 hours in advance. The bill was signed by the governor in October.

    “People are recognizing it’s just not healthy for an organization to go through these flip-flops where you might have a 3-2 majority that keeps a school or a superintendent, then have an election where the 3-2 flips and then the superintendent is looking for a job,” Franklin said.

    Less experienced leaders hired

    Assistant or deputy superintendents in larger districts are moving into the lead role in smaller districts, or superintendents in smaller districts are taking the opportunity to move to more lucrative jobs in larger districts. Newer, younger superintendents are becoming more common, Smith said.

    To meet their administrative needs, many districts are also grooming their own talent, said Molly Schwarzhoff of Ray and Associates, a national education search firm.

    ‘I’m seeing different, perhaps less-seasoned individuals coming into the roles,” McFadden said. “That doesn’t mean they are less talented or more talented.”

    To help new superintendents prepare for their new role, the Association of California School Administrators offers a new superintendents seminar series, a superintendents academy and a new superintendents workshop before its annual Superintendents Symposium. 

    The 2023 Voice of the Superintendent Survey, conducted by education consulting firm EAB, recommends that school boards find ways to help superintendents feel successful in their role and allow them time to connect with students and collaborate with peers to staunch turnover. Superintendents surveyed for the report overwhelmingly said they need help navigating challenging conversations with the community. 

    Superintendents report directly to the school board, something first-time superintendents have never done before, said James Finkelstein, professor emeritus of public policy at George Mason University in Virginia. The new superintendent now has multiple bosses, often with divergent interests. They also have to deal directly with parents and external interest groups.

    “No amount of academic training or a certificate can prepare someone for this trial by fire,” Finkelstein said. “The bottom line is that there is no substitute for experience. But the catch-22 is that the only way to get the experience is by doing the job. Every school district would like an experienced superintendent who has demonstrated success in their previous position.  But finding those individuals is increasingly difficult, especially given the dramatic turnover since Covid.”





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  • Why five superintendents decided to walk away from their jobs

    Why five superintendents decided to walk away from their jobs


    Credit: Julie Leopo / EdSource

    California school superintendents have been leaving their jobs in large numbers this year. Many reached retirement age; others, tired of dealing with the aftermath of pandemic school closures, are retiring early or leaving for other jobs or business opportunities. Some are just looking for a change.

    Then there are the superintendents who, having put off plans for retirement to help districts through pandemic closures, now finally feel comfortable enough to leave.

    The result: a turnover of superintendents, with older, more experienced veterans being replaced by new, less experienced leaders.

    EdSource interviewed five California superintendents who either recently left or are leaving their jobs, to better understand what compelled them to step down.

    Covid, threats push Chris Evans to early retirement

    Chris Evans retired as the superintendent of Natomas Unified after the 2022-23 school year.
    Credit: Jeff McPhee

    Former Natomas Unified Superintendent Chris Evans has been the target of multiple personal threats in recent years, but in September 2021, the hateful rhetoric grew so intense that the school board agreed to pay for security for his home.

    A school board meeting in September 2021 was abruptly canceled during public comment because of the raucous behavior of some in the audience.

    Parents and members of the Sacramento community were upset about comments made by an Inderkum High School teacher who was secretly recorded claiming he kept an antifa flag in his classroom and encouraged his students to protest, according to media reports. 

    Evans announced at the meeting that the teacher had been put on paid leave pending an investigation.

    “Following the Sept. 1 meeting, each trustee and Chris received numerous — 150-plus — disturbing emails that were forwarded, I believe, to local and federal law enforcement agencies,” said Susan Heredia, Natomas Unified board president.

    “People would show up in front of my house, take pictures, speak to my children,” Evans said. “They would call the district and say they were headed to my house and would be intercepted going to my house.”

    Last June, Evans stepped down from his position as superintendent at age 52, after 11 years leading the district. He had planned to retire at 55. He blames his early departure on the Covid-19 pandemic.

    “For me, Covid did it,” Evans said. “Covid and everything that came from that — the politics of it. It was exhausting. That took two years off my career.”

    Evans is still working in the district temporarily, helping first-time Superintendent Robyn Castillo transition to her new role. After that, he will focus on his new endeavor at Action-Oriented Leaders, an education consulting firm that focuses on helping superintendents and school boards problem-solve and troubleshoot, he said. 

    Brett McFadden opted for a quieter job closer to home

    Brett McFadden left his job as superintendent of Nevada Joint Union High School District after the 2021-22 school year.
    Courtesy of the Monterey County Office of Education

    Brett McFadden, 55, left his job as superintendent of Nevada Joint Union High School District in Grass Valley after the 2021-22 school year, primarily to be closer to his home in Aptos with his wife, an administrator at Monterey Peninsula Unified School District. 

    He was superintendent at Nevada Joint Union for four years before accepting a job as a deputy superintendent at the Monterey County Office of Education.

    It was difficult being a school superintendent during the Covid-19 pandemic, McFadden said. Nevada Joint Union High School District, like others in the state, had contentious school board meetings that centered on issues like masking, vaccines and the teaching of critical race theory. 

    “We went from board meetings that were not that well attended to board meetings that would have 300-plus people because of one particular contentious issue,” he said. 

    The community had a long history of treating everyone respectfully before the pandemic, but that changed within months, McFadden said. 

    “We lost empathy and grace,” McFadden said.

    There also was a sharp increase in vitriolic comments from the community, he said.

    “You know you can take those with a grain of salt, but when you hear 30 or 40 of them, and then you’re accused of not caring about kids, or destroying the education of kids or destroying kids’ lives after you’ve committed your entire career and your entire sense of being as a human being, as a professional, to fostering students’ lives and opportunities, that takes a toll on people,” McFadden said.

    Despite the difficulties of the last few years, McFadden misses working at a school district. He expects he’ll return to one in some capacity someday, although he isn’t sure when.

    Normalcy and ‘the sweet spot’ entice Brian Dolan to retire

    Brian Dolan will retire as superintendent of Dixon Unified School District after this school year.
    Credit: Stewart Savage, Abaton Consulting

    Dixon Unified Superintendent Brian Dolan, 62, has reached the “sweet spot” —  the age where superintendents begin to reap the best retirement benefits. He’ll retire after this school year.

    Although Covid-19 took the fun out of the job for a while, Dolan is glad he stayed long enough to see things almost return to normal.

    “If I were at retirement age, just coming out of Covid, I would’ve needed to work another year just to put a little shine back on the apple,” he said. 

    Three of the six districts in Solano County had their superintendents retire in the last three years, Dolan said. 

    “None of us are going out early, but all of us are going out as early as we can,” he said.

    Other than some discontent during Covid-19 school closures, Dixon’s school board meetings haven’t had the drama seen in many other districts, Dolan said. They haven’t been contentious and Dolan hasn’t been threatened. But he acknowledges the jobs of all school employees have become harder.

    Dolan has spent a quarter-century of his 35-year career at Dixon Unified School District — 13 as its superintendent. He still finds delight in talking to students who recognize him on the street or when he answers his door on Halloween. The youngest ones pronounce his name Mr. Donut.

    “Wow. I wouldn’t change a thing for myself, because there are so many good things to come out of this as well, but it’s hard work,” Dolan said.

    He doesn’t plan to sit out for too long — probably just the six months required by the state. Dolan sees himself doing administrative coaching or support, or working with student teachers in the future.

    Cathy Nichols-Washer pushed back retirement until things got better

    Cathy Nichols-Washer was the superintendent of Lodi Unified for 15 years.
    Credit: Ken Sato

    Cathy Nichols-Washer, 60, stayed at the helm of Lodi Unified School District in northern San Joaquin County longer than she thought she would. After 15 years, she was the longest-serving superintendent in the district’s history when she retired at the end of last school year.

    Like many superintendents, Nichols-Washer didn’t have the heart to follow through with plans to retire two years earlier, because the Covid-19 pandemic changed her plans. 

    “I just didn’t feel right leaving the district in the midst of all that,” she said. … “So I stayed, and then, after Covid was over and we kind of got things — I’m not going to say back to normal, but back to a place that felt good and comfortable — you know, on a good track again, then I felt comfortable leaving.” 

    During the pandemic, superintendents had to manage the district and get their job done, while dealing with the negativity directed at them at board meetings, on social media and through emails. Nichols-Washer found it particularly difficult to explain to the community why state Covid regulations were changing weekly, if not daily.

    To make matters worse, everyone had a different opinion about the dangers of Covid, she said. Some staff members were afraid to come to work and some parents were afraid to send their children. Others were fighting every regulation, refusing to wear masks, choosing not to be vaccinated, said Nichols-Washer.

    “And then there was anger, because people felt so strongly about the issue that it came out, in many cases, in a very aggressive manner,” she said. “And so board meetings got very contentious, packed board meetings, people yelling and screaming, unruly.”

    Nichols-Washer understands why so many superintendents leave as soon as they reach retirement age. “You can’t blame them,” she said.

    Gregory Franklin moved from Tustin Unified to professor post at USC

    Gregory Franklin retired as superintendent of Tustin Unified in the middle of the 2021-22 school year.
    Credit: Courtesy of Gregory Franklin

    Gregory Franklin, 61, retired as superintendent of Tustin Unified School District in Orange County in the middle of the 2021-22 school year to be a professor of education at the University of Southern California, a position he says doesn’t come around often. 

    Franklin said he could have started working at the university at the beginning of the school year, but he wanted to allow the school board to find a replacement without having to get an interim superintendent.

    He has nothing but good things to say about the Tustin Unified school board, which he says puts the education of children first. He was superintendent of the school district for 10 years.

    “There was a position that came open, and I applied for it,” Franklin said. “I was pretty close to retirement anyway, so I probably left maybe a year or two earlier than I would have otherwise.”

    Being a superintendent has always been a hard job, but it became much harder after the pandemic school closures and the “really brutal politics at the district level” that followed, he said.

    Anger at school closures morphed into anger at masking and other Covid regulations.

    After the 2020 murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, school districts took a look at what they were doing to contribute to the inequity, Franklin said. Schools started to diversify the range of novels and authors available in school so that students could see characters in stories that had similar backgrounds and family structures as their own, but that also made some people angry, he said.

    Then LGBTQ+ rights and students’ right to privacy about their gender decisions bumped up against parental rights, making more people angry, he said.

    “And so we had one thing after another, really starting in May 2020, that has spun things up,” Franklin said. “The number of irate speakers who come to school board meetings now to berate the superintendent, the school board, and school leaders — it’s hard for people. “





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  • Salaries, benefits increase as school superintendents become harder to find

    Salaries, benefits increase as school superintendents become harder to find


    LAUSD Superintendent Alberto Carvalho is among the highest paid superintendents in the state.

    Credit: Credit: Julie Leopo / EdSource

    Superintendent candidates are in the driver’s seat in California, where openings are plenty and fewer veteran candidates are interested. The result is higher salaries, better perks and less experience required.

    Superintendent pay in California has skyrocketed in the last decade, with salaries in some districts growing more than 60%, according to an EdSource analysis of 53 California superintendent contracts.

    Contracts show salaries that range from $130,000 in rural McKinleyville in Humboldt County, where Julie Giannini-Previde leads a district of 928 students, to $441,092 in suburban Elk Grove, near Sacramento, where Christopher Hoffman is at the helm of a district of 63,000 students.

    Districts must pay a good salary to attract and retain qualified superintendents, said Nancy Chaires Espinoza, Elk Grove Unified school board president. Even with good salaries, some qualified people aren’t interested in applying for superintendent positions, she said.

    “It’s really hard to recruit and retain superintendents because the job has changed, and the job of superintendent has become much more difficult, given the political environment,” she said.

    A survey of 2,443 superintendents nationwide by the School Superintendents Association showed a median annual salary of $156,468 last school year, with pay increasing at districts with higher enrollment. No comparative salary data is available for California, although the California Department of Education has salary information for 2021-22. That year, superintendents in unified districts with 10,000 to 20,000 students earned an average yearly salary of $278,268 and superintendents in districts with 20,000 or more students averaged $319,443 a year. 

    “If the district really wants somebody, and they’re holding out for a higher salary, they’re probably going to get it because it is hard to find people,” said Cathy Nichols-Washer, who retired as superintendent of Lodi Unified School District last school year. 

    Superintendent contract highlights

    Alberto Carvalho, Los Angeles Unified: Car, driver, security, $1.5 million life insurance policy, $50,000 moving allowance, $50,000 for tax-sheltered annuity, can ask to cash out unused vacation days.

    James Hammond, Ontario-Montclair School District: Lifetime health benefits for himself and family, can cash out vacation days, $66,000 annual contribution to tax-deferred annuity.

    Donald Austin, Palo Alto Unified: Can choose to rent a house from the district for $1,800 a month or take an annual salary increase of $25,000.

    Samuel Buenrostro, Corona Norco Unified: He can’t take employees with him when he leaves the district.

    Bryon Schaefer, Kern High School District: Contract allows him to work as a consultant for the district up to 30 days a year for up to five years after retirement at the same daily rate he made as superintendent, with requisite raises.

    Kayla Johnson-Trammel, Oakland Unified:  Three-month paid sabbatical included in 2022 contract.

    Superintendent of fifth-largest district, one of highest paid

    Elk Grove’s Hoffman makes $1,000 more a year in salary than Alberto Carvalho, the superintendent of Los Angeles Unified, the state’s largest school district, according to the most recent employment contracts available to EdSource. Carvalho, who leads a district of 538,000 students, earns a $440,000 base salary, with no promise of annual raises.

    Hoffman’s current salary is a 63% increase over the $270,000 salary he received when he was hired in 2014. He also earned 2% bonuses this school year and last, as well as retroactive pay raises, according to his contract. Hoffman’s salary is higher because his car and expense allowances have been folded into his pay, said Chaires Espinoza. Last year Hoffman’s benefit package was worth $133,780, she said.

    Carvalho’s benefit package more than makes up for the difference in salary. It includes a $1.5 million district-paid life insurance policy, use of a car, a $50,000 annual contribution to a retirement account, the ability to cash out some vacation days, and the use of security and a driver if needed. He was also paid $50,000 in 2022 to relocate from Florida to Los Angeles. 

    Chaires Espinoza says Hoffman earns his salary. She credits his relationship with the district’s unions with enabling Elk Grove Unified to be the first district to close schools in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. She also cited Hoffman’s longevity as superintendent — nine years — and his knowledge of the district, as other reasons he is worth the paycheck. 

    “I can tell you unequivocally that he is the best superintendent in the state,” she said.

    Superintendents of large school districts aren’t the only ones making big salaries. Some superintendents in smaller districts out-earned colleagues overseeing much larger districts. Bay Area superintendents Donald Austin of Palo Alto Unified and Michael Gallagher at Sunnyvale School District, who earn $378,000 and $374,000 respectively, make more than superintendents in much larger districts in the state, including San Francisco Unified. 

    Pay increasingly tied to employee pay raises

    Superintendents are increasingly asking for “me too clauses” in their contracts that give them the same raises as the employees whose contracts they help negotiate. Almost a fifth of the superintendent contracts reviewed by EdSource contained these clauses.

    “That is more standard than not,”  said Dennis Smith, managing search partner for Leadership Associates, a recruitment agency that does many of the superintendent searches in California. “The superintendent will get the same increases as credentialed staff and administrators. That’s common. People don’t want to see the superintendent get a bigger increase than others.”

    Smith doesn’t think that this impacts superintendents’ decisions when negotiating with their unions. “The superintendent is going to negotiate the best package possible for the district,” he said. “I’ve never seen any self-interest involved in it.”

    Chaires Espinoza says there is no conflict because the school board approves all raises.

    But others disagree.

    “This is a textbook example of a conflict,” said David Kline, spokesman for the California Taxpayers Association, a nonprofit tax advocacy association. “It’s definitely a conflict. You essentially have one person sitting on both sides of the bargaining table. We would like to see the end to that sort of contract. The superintendent should be paid based on performance.”

    Benefits add cost, value to contracts

    There is a lot more to a superintendent’s contract than salary. It spells out how many days the superintendent will work, how much the district will contribute to health and retirement benefits, how the manager will be reimbursed for expenses and whether the superintendent can accept outside jobs, earn overtime pay, or cash out sick leave and vacation time. It even spells out the number of months that a superintendent will be paid if he or she is fired without cause.

    A healthy benefit package can more than make up for a lower salary. Some superintendents receive life insurance policies, stipends for advanced degrees, housing allowances, expense accounts, extra pay for advanced degrees, deferred compensation and annuities, longevity bonuses, lifetime health benefits and district-paid security.

    Less common are things like the option for Palo Alto Superintendent Austin to live in a district-provided house or boost his salary by $25,000 or the three-month sabbatical that was part of Oakland Unified Superintendent Kayla Johnson-Trammel’s 2022 contract.

    “We have noticed in news stories on superintendents throughout the state, it does seem they are being paid very generously from taxpayer funds with many perks the private sector couldn’t dream of receiving,” Kline said.

    Going Deeper

    The salaries of school staff, including superintendents, are public information, according to California state law, but not all school districts make the information easy to find. Even if districts post the initial contract on their website, most do not post the addendums that show superintendent pay increases approved over the years.  

    The California Controller’s Office collects salary data for all state jobs and makes it available on its Government Compensation in California website, but only 22% of school  districts reported salary data for 2022 – the most recent year data is available on the site. Unlike other state agencies, K-12 school districts are voluntary reporters. Senate Bill 924, meant to close a loophole that allows districts to avoid reporting employee income, failed in the state legislature last year.

    Without publicly posted salary and benefit information, the public must ask school districts for the information, often with a California Public Records Act request. Los Angeles Unified was one of the few school districts who have not yet fulfilled a request for public records filed by EdSource in October for this story. EdSource obtained Alberto Carvalho’s contract from another source.

    Superintendent benefits put district in the spotlight

    One case in particular has put superintendent pay and perks in the spotlight. In 2021, Ontario-Montclair Superintendent James Hammond earned $542,988 in wages and $200,608 in retirement and health contributions, according to the State Controller’s website. His wages grew because he was able to cash out 85 days of sick time and 25 vacation days, according to media reports. The district has 18,471 students.

    In 2022 the school board capped Hammond’s annual sick days at 85 and required that he wait to cash out his accrued sick days until he leaves the district, instead of annually, according to the Daily Bulletin. The move reduced his total compensation by $100,000 that year, according to the State Controller’s website.

    The Ontario-Montclair school board continues to be generous to Hammond. In July, the district increased his base salary to $368,547. The contract continues to allow the superintendent to cash out any of his 25 vacation days annually, or to accrue them and cash them out when he leaves the district. 

    Hammond also receives $2,500 a month from the district to pay for a life insurance policy and $66,000 — the maximum contribution allowed — to a tax-sheltered annuity. He and eligible members of his family also receive lifetime medical insurance benefits.

    “I can confidently attest that Dr. Hammond has instrumentally helped to positively transform the Ontario-Montclair School District over the last 14 years,” said board President Sonia Alvarado.  “As one of the most senior superintendents in San Bernardino County, students and families have benefited from his strategic vision and shared leadership style.”

    The amount of compensation is meant to retain Hammond, who could leave for a similar compensation package in a large school district, at a university or in the private sector, Alvarado said.

    “It is a very competitive market, particularly for large, urban school systems where there is usually a high turnover in the superintendent positions that often results in severance packages and settlements that are both costly and disruptive,” Alvarado said. “Recruiting and retaining effective leadership is one of the primary responsibilities a school board should prioritize.”

    CSBA advises against ‘compensation schemes’

    A California School Boards Association template for superintendent contracts offers advice for school boards that are thinking about keeping salaries low and offering bigger perks to superintendents to stay under the radar. 

    “Even when faced with such pressures, boards should avoid using ‘creative’ compensation schemes that tend to erode public trust, such as low salary but exorbitant benefits,” according to the CSBA.

    Instead, the CSBA suggested that the district offer a competitive salary and reasonable benefits that are comparable to what other districts are paying. 

    Legislators try to regulate pay, benefits

    Some states’ legislative bodies are considering capping the amount school districts can pay their school superintendents. California hasn’t taken that step, although state lawmakers passed a bill in 2013 to limit the maximum cash settlement to a district superintendent who is fired without cause to the amount of time left on his or her contract, or 12 months, whichever is less. Before that decision, superintendent contracts could include a payout of up to 18 months.

     Almost every employment contract reviewed by EdSource required that the superintendent be paid if they are fired or, in some cases, if there is a mutual agreement that they resign.

    Rachel S. White, an assistant professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, who runs a research lab that collects data about school superintendents, said, “They (superintendents) are saying they want that protection because they know elections can happen, and the board turns over, and they’re out the next month.” 





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  • Advice from former superintendents on retaining those still on the job

    Advice from former superintendents on retaining those still on the job


    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtAq3plgZ40

    Dedicated mentorship, training for potential superintendents, and trust-building are some of the solutions to curb the growing number of superintendents in California who are leaving the job, according to panelists at Tuesday’s EdSource roundtable discussion, “Superintendents are quitting: What can be done to keep them?”

    Some of the most cited reasons for exiting the profession include polarizing politics, division over the effects of the pandemic-related school closures, and stress.

    “No matter what we may have thought, superintendents became the public face of the pandemic and, in most instances, they were merely following public health dictates,” said panelist Carl Cohn, former superintendent of the Long Beach and San Diego school systems.

    Four out of the five panelists on the roundtable left their superintendent positions within the last four years. At least one cited the Covid-19 pandemic as his reason for leaving sooner than he planned.

    They are far from alone: Superintendent turnover in California grew by nearly 10 percentage points between the 2019-20 and 2020-21 school year, according to research by Rachel S. White of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. After the 2021-22 school year, over 18% of superintendents across the state stepped down.

    “In many cases, it’s not just the divide, but it’s how people are treating each other,” said Chris Evans, who stepped down as superintendent of Sacramento’s Natomas Unified after 11 years. Evans left the position in 2023 after years of personal, hateful threats, some of which led the school board to agree to pay for security at his home.

    It’s evident that much of the political divide seen at a national level is mirrored in California, some panelists said.

    “Anybody who thinks that California is this special place that somehow isn’t part of this national partisan divide… it is really front and center,” said Cohn, now a professor emeritus and senior research fellow at Claremont Graduate University. “So I think we need to spend more time on these issues of who are the good people who can facilitate dialogue across interest groups.”

    Agreeing with Cohn, Gregory Franklin, who served as superintendent of Tustin Unified School District in Orange County for 10 years, added that many superintendents have good relationships with their school board. But he noted that it’s often new school board members who aren’t always well-versed in the importance of a good relationship between the two.

    “How do you bring on board these new board members so that they understand the roles that they’re stepping into, what the role of individual board members is, as well as the superintendent, so that they can try and work in service of children?” he asked, citing the Association of California School Administrators and the California School Boards Association as two potential resources for this issue.

    Public division between superintendents and school board members, panelists said, has become a significant part of why school districts statewide are finding it difficult to attract new superintendents for the positions left vacant by those stepping down.

    Particularly worrying to many of the former superintendents was the issue of potential state budget cuts.

    Some pointed out that the high turnover rate of superintendents in just the last four years has resulted in lower overall experience in the role, just as school districts might begin facing years of financial instability. Their expertise, especially from those who served as superintendents during and after the 2008 recession, could be crucial at this time, they added.

    To increase retention of current superintendents, the panelists suggested greater support for them in the form of mentorships.

    Cathy Nichols-Washer, for example, said that “from Year 1 to Year 20” of her time as superintendent of the Central Valley’s Lodi Unified, “there were times when I needed someone to be a sounding board or even to give advice as a mentor.”

    While she suggested “a veteran superintendent” or “someone in a like position that they can call on,” panelist Vivian Ekchian proposed looking beyond those in the same field.

    That might look like “building cross-sector solutions with communities and community members to solve not just academic but resource, equity, enrollment challenges,” said Ekchian, who recently retired as superintendent of the Glendale Unified School District.

    In addition to a support system, perhaps either the California School Boards Association or the state could offer “annual opportunities for members of the public who might consider running for a school board to come in and understand what the job’s really about,” said Evans of Natomas Unified.

    Given that many superintendents have a background in education, panelists agreed they are often well-versed and trained in building trust and compromising.

    “We know how to work with people, we know how to listen, we solve and come to compromises about differences in our interests, and we’re used to that,” said Franklin, the former Tustin Unified superintendent of Tustin Unified. “This new idea, though, where people are coming in with a set agenda and not interested in a conversation and not interested in reaching an understanding — it’s much more political science than it is social science.”

    In his current role as professor of education at the University of Southern California, he said they have “retooled” many courses “in preparing superintendents to talk about politics and political strategy.”

    Panelists also agreed that public support for superintendents by their school board is paramount in order to attract new talent. As Ekchian stated, public support is important both “in the best of times and also in the most politically charged elements that we see sometimes.”

    That support leads to a strong team between the superintendent and the school board, added Nichols-Washer.

    “It’s all about building a strong governance team; so, a board that is supportive, very clear with expectations, very focused on students and student outcome and student achievement as their priority, strong vision and mission, and ready to support the superintendent as they carry out the goals and directions of the board,” she said.

    The shared expertise among the former superintendents on the panel also led to considering themselves as potential mentors for those currently on the job.

    “I think it’s a great opportunity for retirees like us to get back in and help superintendents and chief business officers and cabinets and boards who haven’t gone through the budget reduction and the times they’re going to face … to be those coaches and mentors and help them manage what we all have done multiple times — and probably is why we all retired and some of us retired early, right?” said Evans.

    And complex as the job of superintendent may be, the discussion ended with panelists offering advice for current and future superintendents. The insight ranged from having a coach built into their contract and relying on county offices for building relationships to forming affinity groups specific to superintendents’ diverse identities and focusing on listening.

    “We’ve talked a lot about the challenges … but being a superintendent is the best job I’ve ever had, and I wouldn’t have traded it for anything,” said Nichols-Washer. “The most important thing, I think, in being successful in this job is the relationship with the school board. If you have a strong, trusting relationship with your school board members, they will stand by you and they will back you and they will make it a joyful job.”





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