All in the Family

Jill Vinson and David Miyashiro

David Miyashiro and Jill Vinson got to know each other as they attended school leadership meetings in Southern California — Miyashiro as assistant superintendent of the Encinitas Union School District and Vinson as principal of an elementary school in the Cardiff School District.

Early on, Vinson noticed his ability to spark joy. “He does a really amazing job harnessing the energy of a room and engaging people to want to try and learn things,” she says. “That is definitely one of the things about him that I loved from the very beginning.”

And when the superintendent job opened up 15 years ago at Cardiff, in the small beach community of Cardiff by the Sea about 25 miles north of San Diego, Miyashiro knew she had what it took and encouraged her to apply. “She took the leap, and I got to watch vicariously through her what it’s like to be at an executive level,” Miyashiro says.

A few years later, he followed in her footsteps when he became superintendent of the Cajon Valley Union School District in El Cajon, Calif., in 2013.

Size Dictates

While Miyashiro and Vinson, who married in 2011, share the same occupational title, the districts they lead are quite different. Some 17,500 students attend Cajon Valley. In Cardiff, which serves kindergarten through 6th grade, the enrollment totals about 650 students.

Vinson loves leading the smaller system, including the hands-on relationship-building opportunities that it provides. With an hour-long commute and much larger school population, Miyashiro’s day-to-day is often busier. He’s involved in local, national and international efforts to strengthen education and school system performance. His experience includes working with the White House and U.S. Department of Education to create a national personalized learning plan.

But the differences in the school communities and work roles provide some balance for the couple at home where they’re raising their daughter, who now is a 6th grader in the Cardiff district. “If we were both … doing the level of commitment that David has, I think it would be harder,” says Vinson, whose job allows her more flexibility.

Miyashiro adds: “Knowing that our daughter is with my wife at work, at school every day, and they get to drive to work together, what a joy. I’m jealous of that.”

Shared Understanding

Still, despite the differences in their two districts, they share common ground about the ups and downs of the position with its multifaceted demands and high visibility.

“The job can be … lonely,” Vinson says. “I work with an amazing team of people. And I know David would say the exact same thing about his team. But at the end of the day, you carry home a certain amount that sits with you. … Having that shared understanding, just getting it, is helpful. It’s a positive. You don’t have to really explain it. You just know.”

— Sarah Lindenfeld Hall

Roberta Freeman and Alvin Freeman

When the Middlesex Borough and Bound Brook school districts in northern New Jersey square off on the football field, it’s a battle between the neighboring schools — and their superintendents, who just so happen to be married to each other.

Roberta Freeman is Middlesex Borough’s superintendent, while Alvin Freeman is serving as superintendent of Bound Brook. From time to time, they’ve played up the on-the-field rivalry. Ahead of the fall 2023 football matchup, Roberta on Instagram dubbed the game, “the Battle for bragging rights in the Freeman household.”

Striving Together

It’s the kind of competitive, but fun-loving spirit that’s representative of the Freemans. That shared vibe might have been one reason why colleagues, mentors and even students kept wondering if the two knew each other when they were teachers at sister schools — with Roberta teaching 2nd grade and Alvin teaching 4th.

“Students would come back to see me, and they would say, ‘Do you know Mr. Freeman,’” Roberta remembers. “And I’d say, ‘No, I really don’t know him.’ And they would say to me, ‘He teaches just like you.’ And I’m like, no one teaches like me.”

Sparks eventually would start to fly after the two vied for the school district’s Teacher of the Year award. “Once we connected, that was it,” Alvin says. “We fell in love quickly.”

The two married 22 years ago and now have 12-year-old triplets. They’ve moved up in their careers — from teacher to administrator to superintendent — in parallel. The couple earned their master’s and doctorate degrees in education together from Kean University, supporting and pushing each other when needed. Alvin became superintendent in July 2022 and Roberta in December 2022. They each lead 2,000-student districts, which sit two miles apart.

“We’re mirror images of each other,” Alvin said.

Positive Vibes

As they juggle busy jobs and raising active triplets at home, they do make time for shop talk, providing guidance or a listening ear when needed. But the guiding leadership philosophy in the Freeman household is to keep it positive.

“We don’t have defined roles in our relationships,” Roberta says. “We just support one another and what needs to happen to make this household run … Keeping positive energy around our home, around our districts, around our children is definitely important.”

Alvin adds: “As a leader, energy is everything. You create the right energy, you bring the right energy, you put the right people around to have the right energy, and it will emanate throughout the district. … That’s a huge part of supporting each other.”

— Sarah Lindenfeld Hall

Krestin Bahr and Bryon Bahr

Krestin and Bryon Bahr met as high school students who connected through a love of sports and competition. Now, those school sweethearts, who celebrated their 40th anniversary in December, lead separate school districts in Washington state.

Krestin has been superintendent of the 9,000-student Peninsula School District in Gig Harbor, Wash., since 2021. Bryon has been superintendent of the 950-student Rainier School District in Rainier, Wash., since 2016.

“People think we got together because we’re superintendents, and we laugh,” Krestin says. “We grew up together.”

Spousal Influence

Building a life as teachers, then school administrators, then superintendents wasn’t the plan at the beginning. After each graduated from high school, the two seemed destined for different tracks. For Krestin’s family, college was the expected path, and she earned an undergraduate biology degree. For Bryon’s family, higher education wasn’t encouraged, so he began working in manufacturing.

They married when Krestin, who would eventually become a science and AP biology teacher, was 22 and Bryon was 24. About a decade later, Bryon followed Krestin into education. Juggling parenthood and full-time jobs, the couple took out a mortgage on their home so Bryon could attend night school to earn a degree. He taught woodshop and drafting and eventually became athletic director.

“I love kids,” he says. “I’ve always wanted to teach. I enjoyed athletics a lot, and I enjoyed high school.”

Throughout their careers, mentors have encouraged them separately to keep moving up the ladder in K-12 schooling. Before leading Peninsula, Krestin was superintendent of the Eatonville School District for eight years. Bryon had been principal of Rainier High School for five years before becoming the district’s superintendent. Now, one of their three children could be following in their footsteps. Their daughter, Kaiya Burgess, recently became a middle school assistant principal in Yelm, Wash.

Disparate Tacks

Their rise to the superintendency hasn’t always been uncomplicated. In 2007, Bryon was serving as assistant principal of Foss High School in Tacoma, Wash., when a student shot and killed another student. He gave the victim mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. “The very next day, we were back in school,” he says. “And from that day on, I’ve always been the first one in the building and, most of the time, the last one to leave because I felt responsible that I didn’t keep those kids safe.”

A few years later, amid national efforts to improve failing schools, Krestin was tasked with overseeing Tacoma’s middle schools, which involved closing one school, firing staff and hiring new principals, among many difficult tasks. The experience helped inform her thoughts on how schools should be led, sparking her desire to become a superintendent. “I wanted to see what it would be like to lead based upon my North Star,” she says.

They lead in different ways, and often people are surprised to learn they’re married. Krestin is more outgoing and politically active than Bryon, they agree. She currently serves on the 23-member AASA Executive Committee. Byron, in turn, says, “I am quiet, and I just get the work done. That’s why we’re such a good team.”

But they operate on common ground. When a serious challenge on the job arises, they are each other’s sounding board. When work keeps one late in the office, the other knows she or he could very likely be the one working late the next week.

“A lot of superintendents go home to their spouses … and they don’t talk about it because they don’t want to bother their spouse,” Krestin says. “We don’t have that. We always have that ability to talk.”

Adds Bryon: “We understand the job.”

— Sarah Lindenfeld Hall

Britney Gandhi and Rupak Gandhi

Fresh from Teach for America stints in the early 2010s, Rupak and Britney Gandhi weren’t a couple just yet but energized young educators in Houston, working at a turnaround high school that needed big changes and leaned on new, ambitious professionals.

Just a few years into his career, Rupak already was an assistant principal. Britney was on everybody’s radar as a high-performing teacher and instructional coach. And at least one co-worker saw that they had more in common than top-notch professional skills and a zest for their work in schools.

“The principal said to me a couple times, ‘Hey, you should pursue her,’” Rupak recalls. “We started breaking up fights during lunch duty together, and that is how the romance bloomed. I did recover a cellphone that a student stole from her once, and I think that might have been my knight-in-shining armor moment.”

Less than a decade later, the couple, now married and the parents of two young children, are leading school districts in North Dakota. Rupak is superintendent of the 11,300-student Fargo Public Schools in Fargo. Britney leads the 300-student Richland 44 School District in Colfax, about 25 miles south.

Contrasting Portrayals

Having two superintendents in the house was never on the agenda. Early on, Rupak set his sights on the title, but for Britney, being a principal was enough. When the family moved to North Dakota in 2018 so Rupak could take the Fargo job, Britney became principal of Richland Junior/Senior High School.

“We felt it might not be the best idea for me to work in the same district where he was a superintendent,” Britney said. “We wanted to prioritize both our marriage and our professional lives to ensure both could thrive.”

Urban Fargo and rural Richland are different in a variety of ways. “A lot of the challenges are the same, but the resources are very different,” Rupak says. The couple draws out some of those distinctions in a joint presentation they’ve given on leading rural verus urban districts. One slide features Britney wearing overalls and Rupak in a business suit.

On occasion, the school districts go in far different directions. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Fargo’s district followed strict masking rules while Richland eased masking restrictions sooner. Despite the stark policy differences, the couple didn’t let it get in the way of their marriage.

“That was a very agitating issue. It did not impact my marriage at all,” Rupak says. “I went home and slept in the same bed as my wife. Woke up next to her every single morning just as much in love with her. We had our own conversations about how our job is to administer the vision of the school board and serve our community.”

Joint Rooting

For the Gandhis, a shared vision and passion for the work keeps them going. However, it will change later this year when Rupak steps down from his role to launch a family business.

Still, he says, his time working as a superintendent has been fulfilling. “Having a companion at home that I can talk to about it probably makes it even more fulfilling and rewarding for me,” he says. “I don’t view it as a job. I view it as a purpose, and I love fulfilling my purpose every day.”

— Sarah Lindenfeld Hall

Travis Jordan and Andrew Jordan

Snowstorms can drop several feet of snow in North Dakota, sometimes as high as the roof of the elementary school where Andrew Jordan has worked. But lucky for him, he had somebody to call on who understood the calculations required when assessing an incoming blizzard, the cost of removing snow from school campuses and the safety of students and staff — his brother, Travis Jordan.

For about eight years. Andrew and Travis Jordan were superintendents in North Dakota school systems at the same time. Andrew currently leads Wilton Public Schools, the brothers’ hometown district of 300 students. Travis served as superintendent of the 740-student Beulah School District in Beulah from 2016 to 2024 before he left to take a role at ICON Architects as an education development advocate.

“I’m 45 minutes west of him, and so every time there’s a bad snowstorm, it usually hits the west first,” Travis says. “The toughest decisions we had to make together were snow-related school decisions. I could always tell him, ‘In 45 minutes, it’s going to be crazy there. You might want to let school out.’”

Following Footsteps

You might say education is in the Jordan brothers’ blood. Their father was one of nine siblings, including six brothers. While he pursued a more lucrative career in the grain elevator business, his brothers all became teachers and basketball coaches.

“We kind of grew up with that through our uncles, so I think that’s probably what led me to this,” Andrew says. “I wanted to be a basketball coach. I wanted to be a history teacher. That’s how I first got started, and it just kind of developed from there.”

As for Travis, who is two years younger, “I kind of followed in his footsteps,” he says. While he was finishing his college degree, Travis even worked as a substitute teacher in Andrew’s classroom.

Travis made it to the superintendency first. Once Andrew joined him, he relied on Travis to navigate some of his new responsibilities — questions about building an annual budget, for example.

“There’s a learning curve, and you need somebody to rely on,” Andrew says. “In my first couple of years … I relied on him probably more than he relied on me.”

Close Counsel

The community of superintendents in North Dakota is close-knit and supportive, the two say, providing advice on weather conditions and much more. Still, it was nice to have a brother on the line too.

“There probably weren’t a whole lot of days where we didn’t chat,” Travis says. “You go to school every day, and you expect the unexpected and you get the unexpected.”

— Sarah Lindenfeld Hall

Elie Bracy III and Eric Bracy

In the rural northeastern corner of North Carolina, the Bracy brothers — Elie III and Eric — spent their childhood inside Weldon City Schools where their parents forged long professional careers in education. Elie Bracy Jr., their father, served as a school administrator for 37 of his 39 years in education. Elizabeth Bracy, their mother, taught special education and kindergarten over 41 years.

That childhood immersed in school buildings and conversations about education prompted older brother Elie to pursue an entirely different path once he got to college. But as he took some classes in counselor education to fulfill his degree requirement, he couldn’t deny his family’s legacy. Education was where he belonged.

“I fell in love with it,” he says. “It was in the blood.”

Eric, who is six years younger, didn’t attempt to circumvent his family’s tradition, which also extended to multiple aunts, uncles and cousins who worked in K-12 education. “I knew I wanted to be an administrator because [my dad] was an administrator, and that’s all I knew,” he says.

The brothers have followed similar paths. Today, Elie is superintendent of the 13,000-student Portsmouth Public Schools near Norfolk, Va. Eric is superintendent of the 37,000-student Johnston County School System, just south of Raleigh, N.C.

A Competitive Spirit

For a period, the two served as superintendents right next door to each other. Elie was superintendent of their hometown district, Weldon City Schools, from 2005 to 2015. Eric served as superintendent in the Northampton County Schools from 2008 to 2014. The two districts sit about 13 miles apart.

On a Saturday in September 2013, the high school football teams even sparred in the so-called Bracy Bowl to play up the sibling rivalry. The day-long event included a full slate of activities for the teams and tailgating for the close-knit communities.

“We had a big trophy made that had Bracy Bowl on it,” Elie says. “Wouldn’t you know it, someone conveniently scheduled a vacation to go out of town with family. [Eric] was afraid to be there. But guess what? They won.”

The brothers credit their successes, in part, to the firm guidance of their father coupled with the softer touch of their mother. “Once we both decided that this is the route that we’re going, he laid out the road map, saying, ‘This is what you’re going to do,’” Elie says. “And then my mom, she came back and softened it up and said, ‘So your dad has laid everything out for you … but just take your time.’”

Brotherly Boosters

The guidance and support they’ve shared with each other over their decades-long careers hasn’t hurt either. In a position that’s often in the public eye, the brothers bounce ideas and personal challenges off each other. And, they say, they can trust each other to keep their confidence on sensitive topics.

“To have a brother that’s in it, that you’re already close to, you grew up with, it makes it that much easier to talk through this,” Elie says. “If it wasn’t for this relationship, I probably wouldn’t have been able to be at it for as long. I’m glad that he listened to my dad and took that plunge and jumped in here.”

—   Sarah Lindenfeld Hall

Brad Neuenswander and Bill Neuenswander

While hunting for his first superintendent job, Brad Neuenswander was one of two final candidates in the running to lead a Kansas school district when he got an unusual call from the school board’s president. The man asked him if his dad’s name was Bill. It was and, as it turns out, Bill Neuenswander, Brad’s father, had written a recommendation letter for the other finalist, Brad’s competitor.

“I had to call my dad and say, ‘C’mon man. You’re killing me,” remembers Brad, who ended up accepting another superintendent’s post a couple of days later. “But that’s how small the state is.”

Extended Ranks

When you’re a Neuenswander in Kansas — or related to one — it’s been pretty easy over nearly the last century to bump into a relative among the superintendent ranks.

Bill’s maternal uncle, Dan Swartz, was a longtime superintendent in the state, retiring in 1973. Swartz had two brothers who served as school administrators before superintendents were ever named in Kansas, Bill says.

Bill served as a superintendent in three Kansas school districts before working at Baker University in several roles, including dean of the School of Education, where he helped develop its doctoral program in educational leadership.

Bill’s brother, Dan Neuenswander, served as a superintendent in Kansas and Oklahoma. C.L. Riley, brother to Bill’s wife, was a longtime superintendent in Kansas.

In addition, two of Brad’s cousins served as superintendents, including Craig Neuenswander. And, for several years, Brad and Craig served as state deputy education commissioner together.

“It was kind of odd that the two deputy commissioners in the state of Kansas had the same last name,” says Brad, currently superintendent of Jefferson West Unified School District 340 in Meriden, Kan., after founding the University of Kansas’ Center for Evaluation and Education.

In total, at least seven family members, including in-laws, held the title of school superintendent at one time or another.

Inherited Office

Again, this is Kansas, and Brad was accustomed to all the connections and coincidences. Years before, he’d served as superintendent of the school district in Cheney, Kan., where he worked from the same desk  in the same office and with many of the same district staff members as his father a couple of decades before. Bill held the same role until Brad finished 9th grade.

“I remember the counselor walked in … and he just kind of shook his head and goes, ‘Well, you’re finally getting paid to be in the office. You spent enough time in here growing up,’” Brad says. His father called Brad a bit “ornery” as a child, and it wasn’t unusual for him to end up in trouble in school.

The superintendency wasn’t intended as the final career destination for either of them. Bill had studied engineering, but life events forced a shift in career direction. Brad briefly worked as a stockbroker but hated it.

“I never pushed Brad [toward education], but I saw the capacity to be awesome at it, and he was,” says Bill, who raised six boys, including another son, Kevin, who recently retired from a long career as an elementary school principal. “But he had to make that decision for himself.”

Network Building

For both father and son, the extended family has provided support and mentorship. But in his quest to live up to the family name, Brad also followed the lead of his father and uncles, building a network of colleagues, mentors and friends beyond the family.

“Always, in the back of my mind, I didn’t want to lower the bar for my family name,” Brad says. “I was afraid if I tried doing it on my own, I would not be as successful. I saw the network that generation had. They were all on a first-name basis. They all knew each other’s numbers. And I thought, ‘OK, I’ve got to create my own network like they did.’”

Whatever influence Brad’s elders had on his career, Bill suggests he might have “exaggerated a bit.” Hopefully, Bill says, “he saw a passion. He has that passion.”

— Sarah Lindenfeld Hall

Rob Busch and Bob Busch

When Rob Busch decided to pursue a career in education, he wasn’t planning on following his father’s footsteps into the superintendents’ office. The long hours — and the tough-guy reputation his dad got when his friends were sent to his office after misbehaving — didn’t look all that appealing. Coaching and teaching industrial technology and math seemed to fit his interests better.

“I always thought I was probably going to avoid that,” Busch says of the superintendency. “I just saw the time commitment. As a principal or administrator, you do have to say no, and you get involved with the disciplinary part of it. You don’t get to be everybody’s friend necessarily. You do have to make some very tough decisions.”

But Rob’s father, Bob Busch, would drop some advice that would eventually pave his path into the school district’s top office. Rob currently serves as a shared superintendent in the Starmont Community and West Central Community school districts in the northeast corner of Iowa.

A Father’s Push

Get your master’s degree, his father told him early on. It took seven years — and a conversation with a colleague about how much his salary would increase with a graduate degree — to go back to school.

Don’t spend too much time as a principal, Bob recommended to his son. Rob moved more quickly to follow this advice. He served as a high school principal for three years before joining the superintendent ranks in 2004.

Rob, with 22 years of administrative experience, previously served as superintendent of Edgewood-Colesburg Community School District, a rural system with about 530 students. Bob retired in 2008 after a long career in education, including service as a superintendent in several districts, mostly in Iowa, for 19 years.

For Rob, his father has been an important sounding board, providing guidance on issues such as how to juggle declining student enrollment. “I got a lot of advice from him about how you go about balancing that budget,” Rob says.

And sometimes he gets some gentle teasing too. “He always rubs it in,” Rob says. “He says, ‘Man, I’m glad I’m not having to put up with that kind of stuff anymore.’”

Next Generation

Bob says he’s been thankful for the opportunity to offer a listening ear and to provide some professional counsel over the years. “I always ask him what he’s up to and what his week is going to be like as far as board meetings and things like that,” he says.

And, like father like son, they’ve both immersed themselves in their work, according to Darlene Busch, Rob’s mother and Bob’s wife. “They never have, really, any time off,” she notes.

And now Rob and Bob might have new family members to mentor into the superintendency. Rob’s two children are both teachers. “I would say back in high school that there was no way I would ever be an administrator. That was not my ultimate career goal,” he says. “I wouldn’t change it for the world. And [now] my kids, believe it or not, are both working on their masters.”

— Sarah Lindenfeld Hall