Why the Board-Superintendent Relationship Must Be Strong Enough to Survive the Hardest Days
There are few relationships in public education more consequential than the one between a board of education and its superintendent.
When that relationship is healthy, it may not attract much attention.
The board governs. The superintendent leads. Difficult issues are discussed. Questions are asked. Decisions are made. The organization moves forward.
But when the relationship begins to fracture, almost everyone notices.
Cabinet notices.
Principals notice.
Employees notice.
Parents notice.
Community leaders notice.
The media notices.
And eventually, students experience the consequences.
Recent national data reinforce just how consequential this relationship is. In AASA’s 2025 superintendent study, 41.1% of superintendents identified board relationships among the issues consuming the most time, while nearly one-quarter identified board micromanagement as an obstacle to doing their core work as educational leaders. NSBA’s 2026 survey of board members likewise found a strong association between how respondents viewed the superintendent relationship and how effective they believed their boards were.
This isn’t peripheral work.
The relationship is part of the work.
And I have come to believe that boards and superintendents need to understand something that may sound uncomfortable at first:
They have to cover each other.
Not cover for each other.
Cover each other.
There is an important difference.
Covering Is Not Covering Up
Let’s begin there.
Covering each other does not mean concealing wrongdoing.
It does not mean overlooking unethical behavior.
It does not mean suppressing legitimate questions, withholding information from the public, or choosing personal loyalty over accountability.
Boards have a responsibility to hold superintendents accountable.
Superintendents have a responsibility to provide boards with accurate information, implement lawful board direction, and lead with integrity.
Accountability is not the enemy of a strong relationship.
In fact, real trust makes accountability possible.
AASA’s guidance on board relations emphasizes clear roles, transparency, regular communication, and shared goals as foundations of an effective governance partnership.
So when I say cover each other, I mean something different.
I mean:
Don’t unnecessarily expose each other.
Don’t surprise each other.
Don’t humiliate each other.
Don’t weaponize information.
Don’t allow disagreements that should have been addressed privately to become performances at the board table.
And perhaps most importantly:
Don’t leave someone standing alone to defend something you decided together.
The Board Governs. The Superintendent Leads.
These roles are different by design.
The board establishes direction, policy, goals, guardrails, and accountability. The superintendent leads the organization and manages the implementation of that direction. Current AASA guidance describes that distinction essentially as the board defining the direction and the superintendent leading the execution.
But an organizational chart cannot explain the relationship completely.
There are moments when a superintendent needs the board to say:
“We asked our superintendent to make this difficult decision. We understood what it would require. We stand behind the direction we established.”
And there are moments when the board needs the superintendent to say:
“The board established the direction. It is my responsibility to lead its implementation effectively.”
That is mutual accountability.
Neither party should suddenly create distance from a difficult decision simply because public reaction becomes uncomfortable.
If we stood together when the decision was made, we should be very careful about separating ourselves when the consequences arrive.
Shared decisions require shared courage.
The Public Meeting Should Rarely Be the First Meeting
This may be one of the simplest principles of healthy governance.
If the first time the superintendent hears the board’s deepest concern is under the lights at a public meeting, something has probably already gone wrong.
The reverse is also true.
Board members should not routinely learn about consequential district matters from employees, parents, social media, or the evening news.
No one likes being blindsided.
And surprises erode trust quickly.
That does not mean public business should be conducted secretly. Open meeting requirements, transparency, and public deliberation are essential.
But transparency does not require ambush.
Healthy governance teams communicate before the crisis.
They establish protocols.
They make the difficult phone call.
They ask the uncomfortable question.
They say, “We need to talk about this before Tuesday.”
AASA Superintendent Verletta White recently made a related point: trust cannot suddenly be manufactured during a crisis; it is built through the ordinary calls, check-ins, retreats, and conversations that occur before pressure arrives.
You cannot wait for the storm to decide whether you trust the person standing beside you.
Disagreement Cannot Become Destruction
Boards and superintendents will disagree.
They should.
Board members bring different perspectives from the community. Superintendents bring professional expertise and organizational knowledge. Healthy governance requires questions, challenge, debate, and sometimes divided votes.
Agreement is not the standard.
Trust is.
AASA similarly notes that healthy governance does not require constant agreement; rather, clarity of roles, trust, and shared purpose allow the relationship to withstand disagreement.
The danger begins when disagreement becomes undermining.
When individual board members begin operating as administrators.
When superintendents begin working around the board.
When information becomes political currency.
When private frustrations become public attacks.
When employees are pulled into competing camps.
When community members become proxies in an internal leadership conflict.
At that point, the district develops competing centers of authority.
And everyone begins trying to determine:
Who is actually leading this organization?
That uncertainty is expensive.
It consumes time.
It damages trust.
It slows decisions.
It makes good people cautious.
And it redirects energy away from students.
Never Make Someone Choose Between Loyalty and Integrity
There is another side of covering each other that matters deeply.
A superintendent should never expect a board member to ignore legitimate concerns simply to demonstrate loyalty.
A board should never expect a superintendent to execute something unlawful, unethical, or professionally indefensible simply because the board wants it done.
Covering one another ends where integrity begins.
The healthiest relationships are not those where people never challenge each other.
They are relationships strong enough to withstand sentences like:
“I support you, but I disagree with you.”
“I understand why you made that decision, but I need more information.”
“I will defend our process, but I cannot defend that action.”
“We need to address this before it becomes something larger.”
Those statements are not signs of disloyalty.
They may be evidence of trust.
Because the opposite of conflict is not necessarily trust.
Sometimes it is silence.
And silence can be dangerous.
Protect the Relationship From Ego
This may be the hardest part.
Both board members and superintendents occupy highly visible positions.
That visibility can make disagreements personal.
Who controls the agenda?
Who receives credit?
Who gets quoted?
Who appears to be in charge?
Who “won” the meeting?
Those questions can become distractions from the only question that ultimately matters:
What best serves the children and community we were entrusted to serve?
Neither the board nor the superintendent should need to diminish the other to demonstrate their own importance.
The superintendent does not become stronger by making the board appear uninformed.
The board does not become stronger by making the superintendent appear powerless.
When one side of the governance partnership publicly weakens the other, the institution usually becomes weaker too.
This is not about winning.
It is about governing.
Sometimes Covering Means Standing Beside Someone
Leadership can be incredibly lonely.
There are decisions a superintendent must recommend that will anger people.
Schools may close.
Programs may change.
Budgets may shrink.
Employees may be reassigned.
Boundaries may change.
Longstanding practices may end.
Boards face those pressures too.
They vote publicly.
They answer constituents.
They receive the emails, phone calls, criticism, and sometimes threats that accompany difficult decisions.
Neither role is easy.
That is precisely why the relationship matters.
Sometimes the most important thing a board can communicate to its superintendent is:
“You are not carrying this alone.”
And sometimes the most important thing a superintendent can communicate to the board is:
“I will not leave you alone to explain the decisions we built together.”
That is what I mean by covering each other.
Different Roles. Shared Responsibility. Same Children.
Eventually every board-superintendent relationship will be tested.
A crisis will come.
A decision will become unpopular.
An election will change the board.
A mistake will happen.
A disagreement will become public.
The question is not whether those moments will occur.
The question is whether enough trust has been built beforehand to survive them.
Because when the relationship fractures, the consequences rarely remain confined to the boardroom.
The organization begins spending energy managing adult conflict instead of advancing its mission.
And children should never have to pay the price for adults who could not figure out how to lead together.
So cover each other.
Not from accountability.
Not from consequences.
Not from the truth.
Cover each other from unnecessary surprises.
Cover each other from public humiliation.
Cover each other from carrying alone what you decided together.
Protect the integrity of the process.
Protect the institution from individual egos.
Tell each other the truth—even when it is difficult.
And when disagreement comes, remember:
The person sitting across from you is not supposed to be your opponent.
You were entrusted with different responsibilities for the same children.
The board governs.
The superintendent leads.
Both are accountable.
Both must demonstrate courage.
And both should work hard enough at the relationship that when the difficult days arrive, the community does not see two competing centers of power.
It sees a governance team capable of disagreeing without destroying itself.
Different roles.
Shared responsibility.
Same children.
And sometimes, leadership means making sure neither one has to stand alone.
