A head of school is the top administrator of a private, independent or faith-based school — the leader accountable for its academic program, faculty, budget, enrollment and mission.
Independent schools use titles such as head of school, head, headmaster and headmistress for the job.
This guide explains what the job involves and how educators reach it — and how the role compares with a school principal's.
What is a head of school (and what other titles mean the same job)?
The head of school is a private school's chief executive — the person responsible for the entire institution rather than one classroom, grade level or division.
Above the head sits a board of trustees — or, at faith-based schools, a diocese, pastor or religious order — that holds the school's mission and finances in trust.
The head does the running: hiring faculty, managing the budget, driving enrollment and answering for the results.
The titles overlap almost completely.
Head of school, head, headmaster and headmistress all describe the job this guide covers, and a school's own tradition decides which one it prints.
(This guide uses head of school throughout.)
Headmaster and headmistress are the traditional, gendered forms of the title; head of school is the gender-neutral alternative.
Some schools split the top job between a president and a head or principal.
NAIS's 2025-26 data has a separate salary row for presidents at member schools that report both roles, and there the median president salary was $353,000 — above the $320,000 median reported for heads of school.
The job's scale is easier to see in numbers.
NAIS counted 1,358 member independent schools in its 2025-26 DASL data, with a median enrollment of 358 students and an average of 469.
NCES counted about 24,040 private school principals in 2020-21, the most recent year its principal data covers, against about 91,900 public school principals — and its public figure includes charter schools.
NCES's private figure spans Catholic, other religious and nonsectarian schools.
Who holds the job is changing.
Per NAIS data reported in March 2026, 47.4% of heads of NAIS schools are women and 15.3% are people of color; a decade earlier, just over one-third were women and fewer than 8% were people of color.
For the wider market — school counts, enrollment and staffing across private and charter schools — see our private and charter school industry statistics.
What does a head of school do?
The job spans everything from mission to mortar.
A head of school hires and evaluates faculty, owns the academic program, builds and defends the budget, and drives enrollment and admissions targets.
The job also includes leading fundraising alongside the advancement office, watching over facilities and safety, representing the school to families, donors and the community, and reporting to the board.
NAIS's 2018 Governance Study asked heads and board chairs what matters most: both groups agreed that ensuring the school's financial well-being and instilling the school's climate and values were a head's primary responsibilities, and both named managing enrollment as the top issue facing their schools.
The balance of the work depends on the school's size.
At the median NAIS member school — 358 students — a head may still teach a class, coach a team or run morning arrival.
At a larger school with division heads and department chairs, the role sits closer to a chief executive's: strategy, people, money and the board relationship.
It is demanding work.
In an NAIS survey cited in the association's March 2026 analysis of head turnover, 44% of heads said they had considered leaving their position because of stress or burnout over the past year.
How is a head of school different from a principal?
The cleanest difference is the accountability chain.
A head of school answers to a board of trustees for a whole school; a traditional public school principal answers up through a superintendent and the district office that runs the school.
Licensure runs the same way.
BLS reports that most states require public school principals to be licensed as school administrators; BLS makes no such statement for private school principals.
A private school sets requirements for its own head within whatever its accreditor, diocese or state imposes on the school.
Authority differs too.
In NCES's 2020-21 survey, 65.3% of private school principals said they had a major influence on establishing curriculum, against 55.8% of charter school principals and 32.8% of traditional public school principals.
Pay data blurs the comparison because BLS has no separate private- or charter-school occupation: its principal figures cover all school types together.
The 2025 median for elementary, middle and high school principals is $105,870 per year, in about 343,800 jobs, with little or no change projected for 2025-35.
NAIS's member-school median for heads of school was $320,000 in 2025-26 — NAIS member schools only, not a stand-in for private schools overall.
NCES's NTPS is a separate series, and it measures the job under its principal label: an average of $78,600 at private schools in 2020-21, against $106,500 at traditional public schools and $99,900 at charter schools.
Who does the head of school report to: the board of trustees
In an independent school, the head reports to the board of trustees — the body that holds the school in trust and sets the governance frame the head works inside.
The board-head partnership is the school's top working relationship: in NAIS's 2018 Governance Study, heads and board chairs agreed that ensuring the school's financial well-being and instilling the school's climate and values were a head's primary responsibilities.
These boards are working-sized.
The median NAIS member school had 18 trustees in 2025-26.
The board-head boundary is where headships strain.
NAIS launched its Leadership Alignment Project in 2025 to help independent schools reduce head turnover.
Its interviews found board-head alignment to be one of the most fragile areas of a headship, with role confusion and uncertainty about where governance ends and management begins as recurring strains.
At Catholic and other faith-based schools, the reporting line may run to a diocese, a pastor or a religious order — sometimes alongside a smaller board.
The structure varies school by school, so a candidate's first job is to be clear about who holds final authority before accepting an offer.
How do you become a head of school?
Teaching comes first on average.
Private school principals in NCES's 2020-21 survey had taught an average of 14.8 years before becoming principals, against 11.9 years for public school principals.
From teaching, the route runs through school administration.
NAIS's Fellowship for Aspiring School Heads is a yearlong program with small-group mentorship from an experienced head.
Its applicants must hold, or be pursuing, a master's or other advanced degree, have three or more years as an administrator in independent schools, and have their school head's backing.
Degrees vary more than the public-school script suggests.
In NCES's 2020-21 data, 28.2% of private school principals' highest degree was a bachelor's or less — against 1.4% at traditional public schools — and 9.3% held a doctorate or first-professional degree.
Association credentials fill part of that space.
ACSI offers Head of School, Principal and Executive Director certificates covering administrative duties for K-12 administrators at Christian schools — an association credential, not a state license.
AMI, the Association Montessori Internationale, offers an AMI Montessori School Leadership certificate that it says is open to anyone interested in developing Montessori leadership skills.
The first years in the chair are supported — and risky.
NAIS's Institute for New Heads serves people about to start, or who have just completed, their first or second year as a head of school.
About one in five new heads at NAIS schools leave their roles within three years or less of starting, a pattern NAIS says has held for much of the past decade.
- Teach and lead at a private, faith-based or charter school
- Move into school administration — NAIS's aspiring-heads fellowship asks for three or more years as an administrator in independent schools
- Consider the advanced degree that fellowship route asks for: a master's or other advanced degree, held or in progress
- Build board-facing experience in the work heads and board chairs call a head's core: the school's finances and its climate and values — with managing enrollment the top issue both groups named facing their schools
- Enter searches directly and through programs like NAIS's Fellowship for Aspiring School Heads
Requirements are set school by school
How are heads of school hired: search firms and search committees
A head search belongs to the school.
The school runs the process and may retain a national search firm to manage it; when it does, the school — not the candidate — is the client.
Carney Sandoe, a firm that also places teachers and administrators, says its services are completely free for candidates, with the schools who work with it paying any fees.
Timing is long-cycle.
The head-of-school searches Carney Sandoe posted in spring 2026 — for Nichols School, Allen-Stevenson and Maret — all targeted a July 2027 start, schools searching more than a year ahead of the start date.
The paper trail is specific.
In those searches, candidates submitted a cover letter and current résumé as separate PDFs, and selected candidates could be asked for five professional references — not contacted without the candidate's permission — plus writing samples written for the search.
Process design varies by firm.
Educators' Collaborative, another search firm, says it starts head searches with stakeholder input sessions that feed a Leadership Profile, and stays engaged through the new head's first year.
What other leadership jobs exist at private and charter schools?
A headship is the top of a wider leadership ladder.
The roles below it, and the schools that post them, include:
- Division head, or upper, middle or lower school head — runs one division of a larger school. At NAIS member schools in 2025-26, median pay was $153,296 for an upper school head, $143,216 for a middle school head and $140,000 for a lower school head.
- Associate and assistant head of school — the head's senior deputies; NAIS medians of $200,000 and $154,500 in 2025-26.
- Dean of students and director of studies — student life and academic program leadership; NAIS medians of $101,926 and $121,495 in 2025-26.
- Instructional coach and academic dean — teacher-facing curriculum leadership. At the Achievement First charter network, academic deans coach a portfolio of teachers and often own a particular subject or grade level.
- Charter school principal or executive director — the top job at a charter school.
- Admissions director, advancement director and school business manager — the enrollment, fundraising and finance side of a school's leadership team.
- School founder — starting a private, faith-based, Montessori or charter school as a career rather than joining one.
Where each role sits between the head and the faculty depends on the school's size; in a small school, one person may hold several of these jobs at once.
Find head of school and leadership jobs
The 2026 head searches we reviewed all targeted July 2027 starts, posted more than a year ahead of the start date — so a move into a headship starts with watching searches early and keeping application materials current.
The 2026 searches we reviewed ran through Carney Sandoe, which posts its head-of-school searches publicly with start dates and application requirements.
Keep an eye on a target school's own website and its association's channels too, and keep application materials current.
In the searches we reviewed, candidates paid nothing: Carney Sandoe says its services are completely free for candidates, with the schools paying any fees.
Browse open head of school jobs on SchoolHires.
If you sit on the other side of the table — a trustee, board chair or business officer hiring for your school — our hiring for your school hub collects the employer-side guides.
Career information, not legal advice. Requirements for any school leadership job are set by the school, its board or religious authority, its accreditor and, in some states, the state itself — confirm with the body named before you rely on any requirement described here.