ABSTRACT
This chapter is a comparison of two Hispanic female superintendents’ use of executive and political responsibility. The report is based on two separate studies that yielded many interesting and useful theoretical points that are addressed elsewhere (Ortiz 1991, Ortiz and Ortiz 1992). The present report is limited to a discussion about executive and political responsibility at the superintendency level as enacted by Hispanic females. As has been reported in the literature, (Blumberg and Blumberg 1985, 1991, Boyd 1974, Burlingame 1981, Hess 1977) superintendents’ relationships with their school boards and communities are very often political. The two Hispanic female superintendents who are being examined here struggle to maintain an executive relationship while social, community and organizational forces impose political stress. The objective of this report is to display the distinction between executive and political responsibility, to examine how that distinction is related to gender and ethnicity, to demonstrate how Hispanic females maintain the distinction, and finally to show the process by which executive actions are challenged and politicized.
