School superintendents manage staff and teachers, handle budgets, investigate allegations of teacher misconduct, act as a media representative, and handle construction matters. They usually have years of teaching experience and must have excellent communication and administrative skills.
School districts employ superintendents to improve the quality of schools and manage staff and teachers. Most school superintendents are usually professional educators who have well-known leadership roles in the district. Jobs as school superintendents can be in small rural towns with few schools or in highly populated cities with dozens of schools.
One of the tasks a school superintendent has to deal with is following the school’s budgets. This includes deciding salary increases for faculty and staff. The superintendent may have to decide whether to leave teachers for the next year, based on budget cuts, or hire teachers if there is additional money in the school’s budget.
A school superintendent must handle situations that arise, such as complaints about a teacher’s behavior and other staff disciplinary issues. Occasionally, there are allegations against teachers involving teacher misconduct that may or may not involve a student. The superintendent’s job is to fully investigate any allegations, interview the parties involved, and report any findings to the necessary agencies. If the teacher is cleared of the charges, the superintendent must decide what action to take against the student or other party for falsely reporting an incident.
Another role that the school superintendent plays involves being a media representative for sports games and other events in schools. When school districts have board meetings, the superintendent usually sends a message to parents announcing the agenda for the meeting. If there are changes in the district and a hearing is required, the superintendent will also send a notice of the hearing so parents can choose to attend. Sometimes, in case of bad weather, the superintendent will decide if the schools in the district need to close and will have to alert the public.
Other responsibilities of the school superintendent are to handle construction matters, such as tenders for property and school renovations. The superintendent must ensure that projects are completed on time so that construction projects do not interfere with the school year. Part of that includes keeping school renovations in line with the school board’s budget and reviewing site bids.
Because a school superintendent has a high-profile leadership position, a person in this occupation usually has several years of teaching experience and has often held another job, such as a school principal. This professional must demonstrate that he is capable of performing administrative tasks such as budgeting, record keeping and accountability. It is also essential that the superintendent has excellent communication skills, as a large part of this position is related to teachers, parents and the media.
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