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Journal of Educational Change

, Volume 15, Issue 2, pp 203–230 | Cite as

Who am I and where do I belong? The perception and evaluation of teacher leaders concerning teacher leadership practices and micropolitics in schools

  • Charlotte Struyve
  • Chloé Meredith
  • Sarah Gielen
Article
First Online:

Abstract

The phenomenon of teachers taking on leadership tasks beyond their classroom duties has become widespread internationally. While presented as a catalyst for educational improvement, it blurs the traditional division between teaching and leading and therefore challenges the conventional professional relationships in schools as well as the professional self-understanding of teacher leaders. This article reports on an exploratory study of the perceptions of teacher leaders in Flemish primary and secondary schools. By conducting semi-structured interviews of 26 teacher leaders, we collected data concerning their tasks and the consequences for both their social–professional relations with teacher colleagues and school leaders and their professional self-understanding. From a micro-political perspective, the results demonstrate how teacher leadership introduces new structures of interactions in schools that makes teacher leaders find themselves continuously juggling between two different agendas of professional interests: obtaining recognition as a teacher leader by their colleagues as well as maintaining their social–professional relationships with their colleagues.

Keywords

Teacher leadership Social–professional relationships Professional self-understanding Qualitative case-studies Micropolitics 
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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2014

Authors and Affiliations

  • Charlotte Struyve
    • 1
  • Chloé Meredith
    • 1
  • Sarah Gielen
    • 1
  1. 1.Centre for Educational Effectiveness and EvaluationKU LeuvenLeuvenBelgium

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