I examine a unique Elementary Mathematics Lead Teacher program entering its second decade of operation. The program is based in a large, urban, Midwestern school district, with the vision of developing a cadre of teacher leaders to support mathematics education. The district's professional development content was conventional, including both…

The purpose of this paper is to explore how leaders influence knowledge creation and mobilization processes. As a basis for the theoretical framework, the researcher selected theories that informed the investigation of this influence: leadership theory, knowledge theory, learning theory, organizational learning theory, and organizational knowledge…

This qualitative case study extends the literature on urban district instructional policymaking by analyzing the ways in which normative and political pressures shaped district leaders' instructional policy decisions. Drawing on concepts from the politics of education, it shows how teachers and principals repeatedly nullified policies that aimed…

If educational research stemming from colleges of education is sometimes out of touch, scholarship engaged by school districts and state boards of education is often dangerous in its distant view but arms-length reach. Teaching and learning are enhanced when members of the school community engage in collective grounded efforts to make real change.…

Teacher leadership can improve teacher retention, strengthen the teaching profession, build the capacity of school leaders, and facilitate innovative advances to the structure of school staffing. Therefore, many states are beginning to formalize teacher-leadership options, and this expanded career continuum is expected to facilitate improved…

This article documents a study in which principals were asked to examine the concepts related to the development of teacher leadership in their districts by responding to an original survey sent electronically via SurveyMonkey. Half the respondents were chosen from districts that were involved with a program identified as preparing teacher…

Purpose: This study examines the outcomes of one regional intermediate school district's effort to promote literacy coach role implementation in its 20 constituent districts. The findings from this study provide information about the kinds of district-level contexts that influenced literacy coach role implementation and how those contexts were…

Four years ago, a group of teachers lingered after a district meeting, sharing a conversation about encouraging social responsibility in the school district of Tenafly, New Jersey. That conversation led to the eventual formation of a teacher study group, a grassroots professional learning community that has impacted its members and the school…

This study examined the relationships between teacher leadership, science teacher self-efficacy, and fifth-grade science student achievement in diverse schools in a San Antonio, Texas, metropolitan school district. Teachers completed a modified version of the "Leadership Behavior Description Question" (LBDQ) Form XII by Stogdill (1969),…

Recent school reform initiatives and state mandates dictate increases in teacher accountability with teacher performance based on the results of standardized test scores. Although the number of teachers who choose to leave the profession is distressing, there are those who choose to remain for the long term. Utilizing the modified van Kaam method…

As the national spotlight continues to focus on adolescent literacy, school districts wrestle with the needs of the students, teachers, and schools along with the demands of national and state standards and assessments. This article shares how one school district successfully navigated the needs of all stakeholders to develop a plan of action, a…

According to research on the career cycle of teachers, leadership experience is one of the factors that may influence how teachers think about their career goals. This has implications for schools and districts that seek to retain and recognize the most successful teachers. One urban school district sought to expand leadership roles by creating an…

Designing infrastructures to support instruction remains a challenge in educational reform. This article reports on a study of one school system's efforts to redesign its infrastructure for mathematics instruction by promoting teacher leadership. Using social network and interview data from 12 elementary schools, we explore how the district's…

This leadership framework, based on practices employed by some the nation's most successful principals, can be used to diagnose and address school needs. The framework is excerpted from "Breakthrough Principals" © 2016 by Jean Desravines, Jaime Aquino, Benjamin Fenton, and New Leaders, published by Jossey-Bass, a Wiley brand. The…

The purpose of this "intrinsic multi-descriptive" case study was to explore how a mathematics curriculum leadership graduate degree program influenced seven participants' views and actions as they transitioned into new mathematics curriculum leadership roles. The mathematics curriculum leadership graduate degree program was a joint…