Teacher Leadership and Professional Development

Interest in and knowledge of leadership and learning, separately and together, is an international and continuing phenomenon. This book adds to a somewhat under-researched aspect of the field. It focuses both on a particular form of leadership – teacher leadership, and on a particular form of learning – professional development. It considers the connection between teacher leadership and professional development and the first chapter relates this connection to a ‘Leadership for Learning’ conceptual framework, developed through an international, three-year project.

The book’s chapters explore teacher leadership and professional development from a number of perspectives, giving rise to three points of particular significance. Firstly the chapters show that, either by accident or design, there is a growing cadre of teacher leaders emerging from a multitude of professional development activities and initiatives. Secondly, a number of new conceptual frameworks are put forward, alongside the adaption and development of extant ones that add to the ever-increasing theorisation of educational leadership and professional development literature. Thirdly, the chapters provide evidence of the connections between leadership and learning as conceptualised in the ‘Leadership for Learning’ framework.

This book was originally published as a special issue of Professional Development in Education.

Alex Alexandrou is a freelance academic, based in the UK. He has worked in both the public and private sectors gaining considerable experience in developing and evaluating professional development programmes notably for teachers, military, police and mine action personnel. Alex is currently leading the development and delivery of leadership programmes for teachers as well as being part of an international academic research project investigating teacher leadership in alternative contexts. He is an Associate Editor of the academic journal Professional Development in Education, a Fellow of the International Professional Development Association and a Visiting Professor at the Toulouse Business School, France.

Sue Swaffield is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Cambridge Faculty of Education, UK. She is a member of the Leadership for Learning academic group and a founder member of Leadership for Learning: the Cambridge Network. Sue researches and teaches in the fields of educational leadership, school improvement and assessment, and co-ordinates MEd and MPhil programmes in Educational Leadership and School Improvement. Through the Faculty's Centre for Commonwealth Education she is engaged with a collaborative development and research programme building headteachers' leadership capacity in Ghana. Sue is an Associate Editor of the international journal Professional Development in Education, Executive Editor of Assessment in Education: Principles, Policy and Practice and is on the Editorial Board of Reflective Teaching. Her work in Higher Education builds on previous experiences as a school teacher and adviser.