School-to-School Networks for Sustaining Education Innovation Change: Situating Teacher Leaders at Every Middle of the System

Abstract

Educational innovations enacted into any system is challenging especially if the interventions are to be sustained by the stakeholders themselves.. This chapter documents a study on a network of schools over the course of three years of their journey involving learning technologies in two subject disciplines. School-to-school networks over and above teacher-to-teacher networks were formed and teacher leaders emerged in the course of the implementations. The concept of leadership from the middle (LftM) is proposed at three levels of the school cluster system. The chapter argues that LftM and teacher leadership involving systemic thinking, ecological leadership, and apprenticing among teachers are central tenets for sustainable change. School leadership is juxtaposed with teacher leadership with the trust relationships between the two. The chapter also discusses policy-to-practice translational implementation issues, including the supply of shared expertise and resources, as schools transform toward inquiry-based learning practices for twenty-first century learning.