Ed.D. Degree: Do You Need a Doctorate to Be a Head of School?

The Ed.D. — the full name is Doctor of Education — is a doctoral degree in the field of education.

The clearest way to see what one looks like for school leaders is a named program: Teachers College, Columbia University's hybrid Ed.D. in Executive Leadership, offered with its Klingenstein Center on a Global and Independent Education Leadership pathway.

With the transfer of 30 credits from prior graduate study, its students earn the Ed.D. in 3 years — the program's own framing of its length.

The program listed January 15, 2027 as the application deadline for its next cohort; confirm it with the program before you apply.

The Klingenstein Center traces to 1977, when the Klingenstein Fund created the Joseph Klingenstein Fellows — described as the first university-based leadership training for the independent school field — and the center reports nearly 4,000 alumni.

One program is not a survey of the degree market, so this guide stays inside what named programs publish.

The short answer from our research: no blanket requirement, and a real spread in the degrees private school principals hold.

Start with licensing, because that is where the public-school script breaks: BLS states that most states require public school principals to be licensed as school administrators, and it makes no such statement for private school principals.

A doctorate is a separate credential from that license, and nothing we verified ties a headship to one.

In NCES's 2020-21 survey, private school principals' highest degrees spread across every level the table reports: 28.2% a bachelor's or less — against 1.4% of traditional public school principals — 51.6% a master's, 11.0% an education-specialist degree, and 9.3% a doctorate or first-professional degree.

The share of independent school heads holding doctorates is often quoted from older studies; our research could not verify a current figure from NAIS's published data.

What is documented is the bar at association programs one rung below a headship.

NAIS's Fellowship for Aspiring School Heads asks candidates for a master's or other advanced degree — held or in progress — plus three or more years as an administrator in independent schools and their head's backing.

That is one program's admission bar, not a hiring rule: schools, and the boards or religious authorities behind them, set what they ask of head candidates.

For the job itself — what a head does, how searches run and who gets hired — read our head of school career guide.

Charter leadership development, in the programs our research verified, runs through fellowships and coaching built around experience.

Relay's Leverage Leadership Institute runs one-day workshops for leaders who coach teachers — instructional coaches, assistant principals, department chairs and principals — and Relay also runs year-long fellowships for principals and principal supervisors.

For the founding route, the Building Excellent Schools (BES) Fellowship is a four- or five-year process to found a public charter school.

Its pre-authorization training runs one or two years, with 300+ hours, 20+ school studies and at least two extended residencies, followed by three years of post-authorization launch support.

Its stated requirements are a bachelor's degree, at least 8 years of professional experience including instructional work, at least 2 years supervising adults in a PreK-12 setting, and a commitment to lead the school in the proposed community for at least 10 years.

BES says fellows since 2001 have founded more than 220 public charter schools currently serving over 75,000 students.

The one requirements list our research captured among these programs is BES's, and it names a bachelor's degree plus years of instructional and supervisory experience — no doctorate appears in it.

For the top job at a charter school itself, see our charter school principal career guide.

Honesty first: typical national figures for Ed.D. length and cost are not established in our research, because programs publish their structures and prices individually.

What follows is every figure we did verify, each with its program and year attached.

The one doctorate we verified is Teachers College's hybrid Ed.D. in Executive Leadership: 3 years with 30 credits transferred from prior graduate study.

For scale at the degree just below, the same center's Two-Summers Master's — a 32-credit hybrid M.A. — carried an estimated total of $71,000 in tuition and fees for the 2026-2028 cohort, excluding housing and travel.

Students who transfer 28 qualified prior graduate credits — 60 in total — can earn a Master of Education instead of the M.A., and merit-based Klingenstein scholarships are available.

The association route prices far lower: NAIS's yearlong Fellowship for Aspiring School Heads cost $6,500 for members and $8,150 for nonmembers in 2026-27.

NAIS's weeklong Institute for New Heads, for heads starting their first or second year of headship, ran $4,775 (early-bird) or $5,500 (standard) for members, and $6,200 or $6,925 for nonmembers, in 2026, with hotel and all meals included.

At the top of the ladder, the Klingenstein Heads of Schools Program is a fully funded two-week fellowship for sitting independent and international school heads, and division heads are not eligible.

It covers tuition, hotel and some cohort activities but not meals or travel; the 2027 session runs January 18-29, 2027, and the application fee is $75.

The BES Fellowship moves the other direction: fellows may receive a $100,000 grant in the first training year, plus healthcare reimbursement of up to $6,000 individual or $8,000 family and up to $5,000 in moving expenses.

Every figure in this section is one program's own published price or structure with its year attached — ask each program for its current numbers before you plan around any of them.

The doctorate our research verified is a hybrid program: Teachers College's Executive Leadership Ed.D. blends online study with in-person time on a 3-year structure with 30 transferred credits.

Each program's own pages are the source for its residency calendar, and that calendar is what decides whether an online or hybrid format fits a working school leader's schedule.

At the certificate level, the online route our research verified serves Catholic schools: Loyola Marymount University's online Certificate in Catholic School Administration is an 11-month, four-course cohort program worth 10 graduate units.

Its units also apply toward LMU's online M.A. in Educational Leadership, which requires 21 more units.

LMU limits online enrollment to residents of the states it lists, so check that list first.

Our research did not compile a list of online Ed.D. programs, so treat the format as a question to put to each education school directly.

The comparisons worth asking for: total credits and how transfer credits count, the in-person residency calendar, cohort deadlines and the full published cost.

Both are doctoral degrees — the degree names themselves say so: Doctor of Education, Doctor of Philosophy.

How the two differ in focus is not established in our research, and each program's own pages are the source for what it trains you for.

The doctorate this guide verified is Teachers College's Ed.D. in Executive Leadership, offered with the Klingenstein Center on a Global and Independent Education Leadership pathway, built as a 3-year structure with 30 transferred credits from prior graduate study.

For a school leadership career, the practical question is fit: read what each program publishes about its coursework and calendar, and match that to the work you want.

Our research did not compare admissions bars or career outcomes between the two degrees, and each program's admissions page is the source for its own expectations.

Career information, not legal or financial advice. Degree expectations for any school leadership job are set by the school, its accreditor or religious authority and, where a state's law reaches the school, by that state — confirm with the body named, and with each program, before you rely on anything here.