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Teacher Leadership

One of the cornerstones of the LfL framework of values and principles is the sharing of leadership, which has been explored in relation to the professional identity of teachers. The distinctive approach adopted within all these projects is ‘non-positional’ teacher leadership assumes that all teachers have the capacity to exercise leadership and this can be cultivated with appropriate tools and strategies, including academic certification.

The HertsCam Network has been a site for development over many years. It grew from a partnership between the University of Cambridge Faculty of Education, Hertfordshire Children Schools and Families and schools from all phases of education in the county of Hertfordshire. Now a charity, there is a vibrant masters route and the Teacher Led Development Work programme, which facilitates school-based support groups, and network events throughout the year.

Gisela-Redondo Sama came to the Faculty of Education in April 2014 for a period of two years for the purpose of studying non-positional teacher leadership in action. She was funded as a Maria Curie Research Fellowship scheme. Because of her background with the Include-Ed project at CREA, she was particularly interested in how this approach to teacher leadership can enable schools to build collaborative relationships with parents and communities. To mark the conclusion of her work, Gisela led a seminar in collaboration with her mentor, David Frost. The slides they used in their presentation can be accessed here. More info on the Teach-In project here.

Transforming education through teacher leadership, our first publication in the Teacher Leadership series was launched in September 2014. A Serbian version has just been published in Belgrade for those interested in non-positional teacher leadership in the Western Balkans. Read online.

For further information about the work of David Frost, visit his website.

Join the HertsCam network.

Events and connections in 2016:

A symposium at AERA - In April, David Frost and Gisela Redondo-Sama led a symposium at the Annual Conference of the American Educational Research Association in Washington DC. David made a presentation about the work of the HertsCam Network and the idea of non-positional teacher leadership. Gisela’s presentation focused on what she discovered about the way the HertsCam approach to teacher leadership has flourished in Macedonia and Bulgaria where Gisela had led ‘research visits’ earlier this year.

There were also presentations from colleagues from the CREA research network based in Barcelona. One was about teachers working to empower members of the Roma community and another one was about teachers working with Moroccan mothers in a disadvantaged community in Spain.

The symposium was chaired by John Deflaminis, the Executive Director of the Penn Center for Educational Leadership at the University of Pennsylvania.

Teacher Leadership congress in Washington DC - This annual event brings together academics, teachers and others who share a common interest in supporting teacher leadership in its many forms. It is timed to take advantage of the massive gathering of around 15,000 researchers for AERA. The event involved around 5-60 people from around the world who wanted to share practice and debate the policy issues surrounding teacher leadership. David Frost represented LfL and the HertsCam Network. One of the future events publicised at the Congress was a conference to be held at the Lastinger Center for Learning and Professional Development which will take place in September 2016.

HertsCam participation in a Network Event in Lisbon - On 28th May a HertsCam group will participate in a network event in Lisbon, Portugal to showcase the projects of teachers both in HertsCam and in northern Portugal. The aim is to inspire other teachers across Portugal to get involved with teacher leadership. Workshops will be led by teachers from HertsCam and from the region around Braga in the north where there has been a successful initiative under the banner of the International Teacher Leadership initiative.

Linked reports & resources

The International Teacher Leadership project, No. 12 (November 2011), David Frost
Download or read online. InForm 12 is also available in 7 other languages.

'Phase 1 - A report: Supporting teacher leadership in 15 countries: the International Teacher Leadership project'. Download

Teachers’ self-efficacy, voice and leadership by John Bangs & David Frost, draws data from ten countries including the USA, Bulgaria, Greece, Egypt, Turkey and Denmark. Download or read online.

HertsCam Newsletter

Advancing Participation and Representation of Ethnic Minority Groups in Education (APREME) reports and website – focusing on ethnic minority families in Western Balkans

LfL - the Cambridge Network