In the last five years, the number of superintendents who have been fired or terminated without review has risen slightly. Fortunately, more superintendents are choosing to keep their jobs.
After reaching record-high levels, superintendent attrition rates leveled out to 37.8% during the 2023-24 school year, excluding resignations of interim superintendents, according to data from The Superintendent Lab, a central hub for research on the superintendency.
The latest figures show moderate improvements from the 2022-23 school year, when attrition rates reached nearly 42%. In terms of retirements, attrition rates dropped to 35.2% in 2023-24 after skyrocketing to 42.1% in 2019-20.
Furthermore, between the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years, superintendent attrition rates were greater than 20% in 13 states, and some districts saw greater levels of turnover locally. More than 44% of districts experienced one superintendent departure, 13.8% of districts experienced two superintendent departures and 3% of districts experienced three or more.
Perhaps the more controversial data point reflects a slow increase in the number of superintendents who are being fired. This percentage was at its lowest in 2020-21 at 4.1%. As of 2023-24, that number rose to 5.4%.
Another notable trend uncovered by the researchers is that superintendent termination in some states is more controversial than in others.
For example, the nature of attrition in Florida is described as 50% amicable and 46.4% contentious, according to the data. That’s compared to states like Utah, where only 8.3% of terminations are deemed contentious.
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Superintendent turnover rates by state
Similar data collected by Burbio, a data service company, breaks down superintendent turnover by state in districts with more than 3,000 students. Here’s a brief ranking of the states with the highest levels of superintendent turnover:
- Massachusetts: 30.6%
- Washington: 26.7%
- Florida: 23.6%
- New York: 23.2%
- Indiana: 23.1%
- Missouri: 22.5%
- Virginia: 22.4%
- Pennsylvania: 20.5%
- Colorado: 19.5%
- Texas: 19.3%
- Ohio: 18.9%
- California: 18.8%
- Maryland: 18.2%
- Michigan: 17.5%
- North Carolina: 16.5%
- Georgia: 15.9%
- New Jersey: 15.2%
- Tennessee: 14.1%
- Illinois: 13.2%
- Arizona: 10.8%
