New Synergystic Leadership Theory works for women.

Look at the geometrical solid called a tetrahedron. It's made of four identical triangles placed edge-to-edge. Each of its four points interacts with all the others. A nonhierarchical model, it's the same regardless which point is up.

Two women at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville TX use the tetrahedron to describe a leadership theory they've developed to include the women's voices. They are: Dr. Genevieve H. Brown, dean of the college of education, and Dr. Beverly J. Irby, professor and chair of educational leadership and counseling

They're the 2006 winners of the American Educational Research Association's (AERA) annual Willystine Goodsell Award for promoting women and education. They delivered the Willystine Goodsell Address at the AERA annual conference in April in San Francisco. Goodsell was an advocate for social justice for women and girls in the early 1900s, demanding equal educational opportunities.

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Women today take mostly the same classes with men. They're at least half the enrollment in educational leadership programs. Over the next decade, entry-level school administrators will be drawn from a pool that's 75% women. Yet in a 2001 study of superintendents, women found their academic preparation far less relevant than men did.

What's wrong with this picture?

Equity and theory