Black and Latina educational leaders’ motherwork: a reflection of identity, radical care and collective love Open Access

While there has been extensive work done on caregiving by teachers (James, 2012; Noddings, 2012, 2013; Thompson, 1998, 2004; Valenzuela, 1999), little research focuses on understanding motherwork among women educational leaders in general and women of color educational leaders in particular. Therefore, teachers’ care and othermothering serves as the foundation for understanding caregiving in educational leadership (Bass, 2020; Louis et al., 2016; Noddings, 2006; Rivera-McCutchen, 2021; Smylie et al., 2020; Walls, 2022, 2023; Wilson, 2016; Witherspoon and Arnold, 2010). This research reifies motherwork as an important part of the professional experiences of both Black and Latina women serving as educational leaders.

Our goal is to illuminate the similarities in the experiences of these ethno-racially distinct groups of women to spur a collective approach that gives credence to and cites successes within the motherwork done in schools. Motherwork, an emotionally taxing endeavor, can be undertaken at the expense of Black and Latina educational leaders’ own health and well-being (Ispa-Landa and Thomas, 2019). This is concerning, given that recruiting and retaining Black and Latina educational leaders is of grave importance, as when they are appointed, they typically lead urban schools serving Black and Latino students (Méndez-Morse et al., 2015; Miles Nash and Peters, 2020). Recent data from the National Teacher and Principal Survey indicates, there were about 9,900 public school principals (56% women) and 3,000 private school principals (63% women) in 2020–21 (Taie and Lewis, 2022). However, among them, only 10% from public schools and 6% from private schools were Black, while 9% and 6% were Latina/o, respectively (Taie and Lewis, 2022).

Black and Latina women have been under-researched and under-acknowledged in the leadership literature (Méndez-Morse, 2000, 2004; Méndez-Morse et al., 2015); historically prohibited or restricted from education and positions of leadership (Carroll, 2010; Miles Nash and Peters, 2020). Though research centering Black and Latina women school leaders, respectively, has increased since its emergence in the 1980s–1990s (Brunner, 1999; Campbell, 1995; Mendez-Morse, 1999; Montenegro, 1993; Ortiz, 1982, 1999; Shakeshaft, 1987), it remains scant (Lomotey, 2019).

Black and Latina women are not representative of the dominant archetypal image of a leader (Correll, 2017), existing as double outsiders in being people of color and women (Jean-Marie et al., 2009; Méndez-Morse et al., 2015). While few in numbers, Black and Latina educational leaders have historically faced stereotypes, microaggressions, and limited mentorship in their ascension to and while in professional roles (Bailes and Guthery, 2020; Martinez et al., 2016, 2019; Méndez-Morse, 2000, 2004; Rodriguez et al., 2018; Villarreal, 2023). They experience discrimination associated with their intersectional identities, enduring penalties related to racism, sexism, and other systems of oppression (Beal, 2008; Martinez et al., 2019). While many Latinas also navigate the cultural and gendered expectations of marianismo at home (Martinez et al., 2019; Murakami-Ramalho, 2008; Salazar Montoya and Kew, 2023).

Yet Black and Latina women’s leadership is rooted in a legacy of care grounded in efforts to resist injustices and inequities in schooling (Rivera-McCutchen, 2021). Research on Black and Latina women emphasizes a commitment toward caring for children’s academic and social-emotional growth and that of Black and Latino communities (Murakami et al., 2016; Siddle-Walker and Archung, 2003). This commitment is multilayered and deeply ingrained in their leadership, informed by the history of Black and Latino systemic oppression that results in the centering of progress and achievement of their racial/ethnic communities (Foster and Tillman, 2009; Murakami et al., 2016). In this way, Black and Latina women educational leaders demonstrate facets of radical care.

Radical care, informed by research on Black educational leaders and the history of systemic racism in education, prioritizes creating socially just and equitable schooling for students of color and their communities (Rivera-McCutchen, 2021). Black and Latina women educational leaders possess a critical consciousness; an awareness of self, their values, beliefs, and dispositions (Khalifa et al., 2016) coupled with a cultural understanding of the communities they serve. They maintain a belief in their students’ and communities’ capacity and ability to excel (Aaron, 2020; Rivera-McCutchen, 2021; Wilson, 2016). Further, they foster and leverage authentic relationships with students and families (Rivera-McCutchen, 2021) and promote equitable and culturally affirming learning environments for students (Khalifa et al., 2016).

Research suggests that Black women leaders readily resist systems of subjugation as culturally responsive change leaders and othermothers (Loder, 2005), led by a spiritual calling (Witherspoon and Arnold, 2010) to pursue social advancement and equity (Flores, 2018; Johnson, 2021) addressing the needs of the whole child and empowering their communities (Burton et al., 2020). Similarly, Latinas readily draw on their cultural, familial, linguistic, and gendered assets as conveyed through cariño, confianza, and respeto to connect with and advocate for the communities they serve (Hernández and Murakami, 2016; Hernandez et al., 2014; Jimenez, 2024; Martinez et al., 2023; Martinez and Méndez-Morse, 2021; Martinez and Rivera-McCutchen, 2021; Méndez-Morse et al., 2015; Pedroza and Méndez-Morse, 2016). By this means, Black and Latina educational leaders engage in radical caretaking of their school communities.

While “othermothering” refers to the caring provided by women, including mothers, to children who are not biologically their own, “motherwork” describes the unpaid, unacknowledged labor of women of color who connect their survival and care to the survival and care of all, extending beyond the family (Bernard et al., 2012; Caballero et al., 2017; Collins, 1994) With this in mind, Black women educational leaders lean into the tenets of motherwork to “reduce the harm to Black children within schools” (Watson and Baxley, 2021, p. 146).

The concepts of motherwork and othermothering, however, have not been applied to Latina educational leaders. Though a few Latina feminist scholars have drawn connections between othermothering (Collins, 1994) and the “practice of communal mothering and an ethic of social responsibility” that they grew up with and came to understand as comadrisma/o (Santos-Upton and Hernandez, 2023, p. 71) which they apply in their sister-scholar relationships. “Literally meaning co-mother,” Comas-Diaz (2013) explains how “the comadre bond is culturally anchored in familism” (p. 64) and is often used to describe the relationship between a mother and her child’s godmother. However, the term comadre can be used to describe close, sister-like relationships among Latina women committed to supporting each other, personally and professionally, and in doing so, engage in othermothering of their children (Santos-Upton and Hernandez, 2023). Still, our understanding of the similarities between Black and Latina women’s motherwork is largely embryonic, as their perspectives and voices in doing this work are rarely foregrounded in educational leadership literature (Watson and Baxley, 2021). This empirical work is one of the first to include the collective voices of Black and Latina women to address this void.

We drew on an integrated conceptual framework for guidance that included motherwork and intersectionality. Motherwork (Collins, 1994) “reveals how racial ethnic women in the United States encounter and fashion motherwork” (p. 49). The term emerged during an epistemological shift that distinguished what women of color had to say about themselves from the descriptions of them purported in dominant discourses. Collins, a feminist sociologist, illuminated the impact of race on mothering and noted:

Motherwork, despite being an “arduous task for Black and Hispanic women”, makes room for women of color to stand boldly apart from White women and engage in mothering acts that empower the children and members of various “racial ethnic communities” in which they serve (Watson, 2020, p. 246). Rooted in “themes of survival, power, and identity”, motherwork undergirds the leadership practices enacted by Black and Latina educational leaders charged with “ensuring the survival of children” to spur the survival of multiple racial ethnic families and communities (Collins, 1994, p. 49).

Intersectionality, a significant framework advanced by Crenshaw (1991), facilitates the analysis of social inequities reinforced by multiple factors (Johnson, 2021). It acknowledges that women of color are not a homogeneous group and that the experiences and identities of Black, Latina, Asian, and Native American/Indigenous women should not be essentialized. The hierarchical power structures and opportunities for the marginalization of underrepresented groups inherent in the culture of schools (Agosto and Roland, 2018) creates an opportunity for us to employ intersectionality to center the praxis of Black and Latina women educational leaders, as members of more than one socially oppressed group.

This qualitative study merged narratives from Black and Latina educational leaders from two separate studies, respectively, that utilized narrative inquiry (Hendry, 2009; Riessman, 2008) to center the lived experiences of women of color educational leaders through critical, feminist, and intersectional frameworks. The rationale for this was based on the research team’s shared research interests on women of color in educational leadership, their own positionalities as women faculty of color in educational leadership (two pre-tenured Black women and one tenured Latina) with experience as educators and leaders in K-12 settings, and their access to existing data from two narrative studies with similar epistemological underpinnings (Welton and Martinez, 2014).

We engaged in secondary analysis via the informal sharing of existing qualitative data (Heaton, 2008; Saldaña and Omasta, 2021) to examine how caregiving in the form of motherwork showed up in the professional lives of Black and Latina school leaders. While motherwork was not the primary focus of either study, the narratives examined for this secondary analysis were purposefully chosen because they included women of color leaders who referenced examples of motherwork in their administrative roles. Therefore, while some data we examine has been utilized for other published works, the six narratives in this study have not been analyzed collectively with this intent.

Author 2 was the primary researcher for Study 1, which included four Black women public school principals in two urban districts in the southeast. Author 2 conducted purposeful sampling to recruit participants. As Study 1 focused on Black women principals in suburban contexts, the researcher identified Black women principals through an online search of school district websites and emailed recruitment invitations to prospective participants; the participants were those who accepted the invitation. Narratives were captured in person and via Zoom, audio recorded, and transcribed. The original study aimed to understand women’s approaches to and practices in leadership through the lens of intersectionality. Three narratives from the previous study were selected for this research because, in the context of describing their leadership, these three women leaders divulged ways they stepped in as othermothers to serve students and faculty of color. They revealed how they enacted culturally responsive practices to attend to the needs of their schools amidst varied challenges.

Author 3 was the primary researcher for Study 2, including 18 Latina school leaders from seven states. The study utilized testimonio (Delgado Bernal et al., 2012) to document the experiences and career trajectories of current or former Latina school leaders, with a focus on understanding how the cultural, linguistic, and gendered identities and backgrounds of these women shaped their roles. Participants for study 2 were recruited through Author 3’s professional network, as well as a national Latino organization for school administrators. The three narratives examined here were chosen from the original sample because they included the most explicit and detailed examples of motherwork among the original data set. Narratives were collected via Zoom or phone call, audio recorded, and transcribed.

Data for this study include narratives from three Black women from Study 1 and three Latina women from Study 2, with pseudonyms used for confidentiality. The three Black women include: Vivica, a principal of a PK-5th grade elementary school in a southeastern state serving majority of Hispanic students, Monique, a principal of a PK-5th grade neighborhood elementary school serving predominantly Black students, and Pamela, a PK-5th grade elementary school principal serving a 95% Black student population. The three Latina women include: Barbara, a Puerto Rican assistant principal of a PK-8th grade school in New York, Lorena, a former assistant principal and principal of Mexican descent from California working at an educational nonprofit, and Wendy, a middle school assistant principal of Mexican descent from Texas.

An inductive, thematic analysis was taken to understand the content of the narratives and formulate typologies where excerpts of participants’ narratives served as evidence (Riessman, 2008). This process entailed the research team reading and familiarizing ourselves with the narratives, with transcripts shared collectively via a secured online shared drive. Considering the research question and framework, the team identified and highlighted portions of data to develop codes that reflected descriptions and actions representing caregiving via motherwork (Saldaña and Omasta, 2021). Codes were analyzed for connections and distinctions in the women’s experiences resulting in three descriptive themes capturing what shaped and how they carried out motherwork in their roles. The team chose portions of the women’s narratives to illustrate each theme.

The narratives of the Black and Latina women leaders in this study revealed how they embraced aspects of their identities to explore and enact educational leadership strategies to combat systemic and racial oppressions from an anti-patriarchal stance (Collins, 1994; Johnson, 2021). When describing motherwork they engaged in, the politically and communally motivated care they showed their school communities was inextricably linked to their intersectional identities--as women of color leaders.

Barbara, Lorena, and Wendy relayed the innate nature of how their Latinidad, gender, and upbringing shaped the motherwork they engaged in as leaders. Barbara noted, “You can never take the Latina out of a school leader. Once you’re a Latina, you’re a Latina.” She also admitted to her “Latina mommy card … always [being] present” in working with students. Barbara was even referred to by others as the “mom from the Bronx,” which for her was a way for her to draw on her strong Latina female mothering approach “to have that connection” with others in her role as leader.

Similarly, Lorena affirmed how her ethnic, cultural and gendered Latina identity “really drove the way that I operated and the culture that I set in my school.” “I came from that neighborhood, that community. I related to the families at a different level and so they trusted me a lot,” she confessed. “The children are my family … family plays a big role in culture and the way that we’re brought up, at least for me as a Mexican woman.” Consequently, she made sure that the team she “hired and had on board were of the same thinking.”

Wendy felt that Latinas were often underestimated as leaders, “what people miss is how strong a Latina, female school leader can actually be.” This translated to essential motherwork, where her identity as a Latina woman made all the difference in the “impact” she had “on kids.” “In a school like mine where the kids are predominantly Hispanic, they need those role models,” she explained. It was not “a strong man” that was needed “to go in there and just tell the kids who the boss is,” as she was once told by a Hispanic male colleague. She believed he “wouldn’t last one day” with her students with this patriarchal approach.

Vivica was also “convinced that there is something inherent” that drives the motherwork of women of color administrators. “Due to the struggles that we have faced and the roles we've had to play throughout history … we are built very differently,” she asserted. “The role of Church, the role of spirit, the role of God, the role of pushing through, has given us something that we probably can't even put words to and that we don't even recognize, that we have in ourselves.” She believed this played “a major role” in who women of color are, how they “respond to challenges,” and how they “respond to life … and respond to people.”

Motherwork was inextricable from the Black and Latina leaders’ intersectional identities, inclusive of geographical upbringing, gender, motherhood, and ethnic and cultural background. Their multiplicative identities informed their perceptions of self and leadership approaches, as they employed their gendered cultural knowledge to engage and serve their school communities.

The Black and Latina school leaders demonstrated notions of Rivera-McCutchen’s (2021) radical care as they conveyed love, passion, and an antiracist, protective stance for their students and community; they enacted leadership to create more socially just and equitable schools for their students and community. Maintaining radical hope and visions of more equitable education systems and communities for their students (Rivera-McCutchen, 2019), they leveraged their identities and agency as leaders to reduce harm and care for others’ children as their own; findings aligned with motherwork literature (Watson and Baxley, 2021).

Vivica’s embodiment of radical care as “the Black Mama” illustrated how her motherwork was tethered to her identity as a Black woman. Recognizing the promise in her students while acknowledging “what the world” says about Black boys, she unapologetically used her position to champion, nurture, and motivate her students.

Wendy described enacting leadership in a similar manner. “I’ve got this real motherly instinct toward my kids,” she acknowledged, “They’re like my own personal children.” Because of the radical care she showed, students confided in her about how their “mother walked out,” on them at, “three years old,” or how “their parents are in prison again and now they gotta go live with a tia (aunt) who doesn’t like them.” Latina leaders “do a lot more than counseling and ask more than all the curriculum” she believed, “because the kids feel comfortable and they come to you.”

The women also demonstrated radical care for school staff, engaging as surrogate family members and participating in teachers’ pivotal life events. Barbara referenced as much: “I think when people need me, I’m there for you,” she shared, and this imbued trust from her staff.

The women’s motherwork exceeded accepted notions of care for their school community. Their cultural identities as Black and Latina women were inseparable from their racial/ethnic histories (Collins, 1994). Black and Latina women have been cultured and reared to rely on collective systems of support and reciprocity (Collins, 1994; Martinez et al., 2023). Thus, authentic relationships resembling familial camaraderie were at the heart of the radical care they enacted, prioritized, and leveraged in their practice.

A recurring theme among participants’ leadership was how they created a loving culture of support and shared responsibility for student success. Creating a loving community was a strategy the women employed to combat the challenges Black and Latino students and their families faced.

Pamela admitted, “I tell the kids, I tell the parents and my staff, I love them,” and this love informed her leadership, as did her knowledge of student and familial circumstances.

I have a lot of young parents, some young whippersnappers who like to come raising sand, rip you a new one, and cuss you up and down. “Come on in my office so I can take off my principal's hat and talk to you sister to sister.” I know the parents, so I can talk like that. I just let them know, “When you coming up here and doing all that, that doesn't look good for your child.” You're supposed to model for your daughter what she needs to become, and model for your son[They reply] “Mrs. Pamela, you're right. I'mma do better.”

Pamela harnessed her cultural understanding to calm and comfort displeased parents and facilitate collaborative relationships.

Monique also relied on cultural understanding to cultivate a safe space for students. As a Black woman leading a predominantly Black school, she recognized how schools have historically been sites of suffering for Black children and cultivated a culture of love with an expanded understanding of student success.

To foster collective love, everyone began the day with the school’s mantra: “They are disciplined. They are kind. They are compassionate. They are loved.” She believed students “own it, and they act it.” Recognizing she cannot “control the outside” but she can “control the inside” Monique made sure students could “eat till you're full every day … that you get the rest you need if you didn't get it last night at home.” For her, “creating an atmosphere where kids can be kids and kids are protected is success.”

Attending to the whole student was a theme further explicated by Lorena, who engaged in motherwork by building students’ self-efficacy, recognizing their capabilities, and motivating them to dream of who they could become.

Lorena’s efforts to foster collective love in her school were grounded in her culture’s emphasis on community, helping, and motivating students to see themselves aspirationally.

Vivica sought to facilitate a welcoming and responsive culture and was proud of her school community coalescing in times of tragedy and need. Her narrative demonstrated the call to collective action that Black women have long participated in, a call undergirded by their love and care for children as their own.

The narratives shared by Black and Latina women educational leaders in this study illuminated “alternative constructions of mothering” (Glenn, 1994, p. 3) and acts of resistance to dominant narratives about their identities–who and what they are supposed to be and do. Women are expected to embody and enact the patriarchal notions of mothering and motherhood that deem mothers as ever-bountiful, ever-giving, self-sacrificing, and totally responsible for children (Collins, 1994) and Black and Latina women serving as educational leaders are no exception. Though participants did not readily delve into the negative effects of engaging in motherwork, it can be surmised that “pushing through,” attending to the social-emotional needs of students, families and staff, and dealing with frustrated parents who can “rip you a new one” is taxing.

Nonetheless, participants' narratives revealed how motherwork was inextricably linked to their intersectional identities; rooted in the acknowledgment of schools as places where their community’s children--Black and Latino children-- have suffered (Foster and Tillman, 2009; Valenzuela, 1999). This influenced their leadership approaches, practices, and engagement in combating anti-Blackness and anti-Latino discrimination (Caballero et al., 2017; Watson and Baxley, 2021). Their resistance aligns with recent literature (Miles Nash and Peters, 2020), reflecting the cultural and intersectional identities that influenced and shaped their leadership practices, inclusive of radical care (Rivera-McCutchen, 2021), an aspect we define as characteristic of motherwork. Participants’ passion and profound purpose to create loving and safe spaces for students and families required attentiveness to students’ futures and employment of their intersectional identities and cultural knowledge when communicating with parents, including nontraditional strategies such as addressing parents with love during confrontations.

Our findings also expand on the previous research on motherwork which has focused on Black women leaders (Bass, 2012; Grillo et al., 2019; Marshall et al., 2024; Watson and Baxley, 2021), to include Latinas. Findings reveal the significant similarities in motherwork among Black and Latina administrators’ roles, not as monolithic but accounting for their intersectional and cultural vantage points as they navigated issues of power, privilege, class and ability to varying degrees. As a Black woman leading a predominantly Hispanic school, for instance, Vivica remained cognizant of how the political climate made some families feel unsafe because they were undocumented, while Lorena, who served in the community she was raised in, was politically astute in who she hired because she understood the needs of students. These examples of collective motherwork, however, cannot be essentialized and considered reflective of all Black and Latina school leaders. A testament to the latter is the fact that the narratives examined for this study were drawn from among larger data sets including Black and Latina administrators who did not inherently speak to motherwork as part of their leadership roles, though motherwork was not the primary focus of either original study and could have been revealed as key to the other women’s leadership had they been asked about this directly.

Additionally, there were nuances in the ways in which this study’s participants referred to their motherwork as part of their leadership. All three Latinas explicitly named their leadership approach as intertwined with motherwork; an aspect of their gendered and cultural identities they drew upon to navigate inequities and deepen relationships with their school communities. Yet despite caring for students as their own, they did not describe themselves as comadres of their students’ parents (Comas-Diaz, 2013; Santos-Upton and Hernandez, 2023). While one Black leader explicitly referred to mothering as part of her leadership (Bass, 2012; Grillo et al., 2019), motherwork was implicitly referenced by the two additional Black women participants. Though outside the purview of this study, future research is warranted that examines the nuances of both explicit and implicit motherwork among Black and Latina school leaders, as well as the intersectionality of comadre work with othermothering.

Finally, the findings align with the sentiments of Marshall et al. (2024), who affirm that characteristics associated with othermothering cannot be taught. Instead, “what can be taught and supported are the dispositions demonstrated by an othermother” (p. 552). Leadership preparation programs can help develop leaders that recognize the need for othermothering, who acknowledge the existence of racialized events and experiences, and who enact their critical consciousness to seek resolutions to combat injustices. District administrators must also recognize the emotional exhaustion and potential burnout of motherwork, as Black and Latina leaders engage in such work without additional compensation, institutional recognition, or the adoption of structural reforms that address the root causes of deeper inequities in schools. Moreover, given the inherent nature of motherwork to women of color, it is likely that Black and Latina administrators engage in this work without recognizing its impact on their social and emotional well-being.

This study reaffirmed the revolutionary collective motherwork of Black and Latina women educational leaders, who, despite facing systemic oppression within and outside of schools, unapologetically identify motherwork as part of their identity, exhibit radical care, and cultivate collective love in school communities. Given their underrepresentation in leadership positions (Taie and Lewis, 2022), Black and Latina leaders’ collective motherwork reflects the historical and ongoing critical efforts of women of color who seek to ensure our humanity, deserving of greater recognition and support in the educational leadership field.