What's the status of women as ed leaders worldwide.

When a group of women in educational leadership looked for a source that addressed the status of their peers in the profession around the world, they were unable to find one. So they organized an international conference, which will become a book and the very resource that they had sought.

The conference and future book began as a project of a special interest group of the University Council for Educational Administration (UCEA). Women from around the globe gathered in July at Duquesne University's Italian campus in Rome for "Sharing the Spirit, Fanning the Flame: Women Leading Education Across the Continents." The weeklong living-and-learning community was the first step in identifying best practices and ways for women leaders across the world to use them.

Five of the more than 40 women who participated in the Rome seminar reported on their experiences in the keynote address at the University of Nebraska conference on Women in Educational Leadership held in Lincoln in October.

Dr. Helen Sobehart, associate provost/academic VP at Duquesne University PA, led the group. Others were Dr. Jill Sperandio, assistant professor in educational leadership at Lehigh University PA; Bettie Bertram, supervisor of special education/ESL for the Upper Adams School District in Pennsylvania; Dr. Marilyn Grady, professor of educational administration at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and Dr. Katherine Houghton, campus director of the Salter School in Massachusetts and former dean of academic administration at Ross University, Island of Dominica.

UCEA represents some 60 universities that offer doctorates in educational leadership. Each participant brought her book chapter on the status of women in the country or countries she studied to Nebraska.

Slow progress

Despite years of incremental advances, the news was not good. "Women from virtually every country who came to the conference brought a story of slow progress of women in educational leadership," said Sperandio. Developing countries had priorities that did not include advancing women in the profession. Their emphasis was on getting children into school. But the picture wasn't much better among developed countries.