Characteristics of community college presidents.

Depending upon your definition of women's progress to the presidency, you can see the glass as either half empty or half full. Although women are still woefully underrepresented at senior administrative levels, there's been progress over the past 20 years. In 1986, only 8% of all college presidents were female, but by 2006, that number had jumped to 23% for all schools and 29% for community colleges.

With some 7,000 positions and about half the community college presidencies expected to open in the next several years due to retirements, we're on the cusp of a tremendous opportunity for women to move into leadership positions. How can we take advantage of this opportunity and get more women in the pipeline?

Through their research Dr. Suzanne Campbell, Dr. Kathryn Mueller and Dr. Jane Souza are trying to tease out the characteristics, qualities and paths to the top for female community college presidents. The trio reported on their study of women presidents at the University of Nebraska's Women in Educational Leadership conference held in Lincoln in October. This study followed a pilot study done together as part of their doctoral work at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

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Campbell is the medical laboratory technician program coordinator at Seward County Community College in Kansas. Mueller is the dean of student services at California's Orange Coast College. Souza is executive director of CONNECT: A Southeastern Massachusetts Public Higher Education Partnership.

After earning their degrees, the trio has continued their work on the topic of women's paths to the presidency at two-year schools. "All three of us had an interest in this so we took ownership and continued the study after we didn't need a grade," said Mueller.

Their study