Search results

Middle leaders are educators whose practices of building relational trust are critical for generating the kind of strong and sustainable professional learning communities necessary for leading productive site-based education development in their school. This chapter specifically focuses how building an ethic of relational trust, experienced in five interrelated dimensions, aligns with establishing core foundational conditions for building community. Building trust and communities of professional learners are not mutually exclusive – in fact, each reciprocally facilitates, progresses, supports, and sustains the development of the other. The foundations for community building, described as cornerstones, form over time and progressively involve, and achieve, contextuality, commitment, communication, collaboration, criticality, and collegiality. Reflection questions are provided throughout; these are designed to directly focus the attention of middle leaders towards understanding and developing their own trust practices, that with time, create conditions for generating strong viable communities of professional practice.

Teachers are an adaptive group of professionals and in this chapter, we explore the ways that teachers can develop themselves as leaders, even in the absence of strong support or leadership. We explore the manner that these skill sets and strengths can be cultivated, providing lived examples of how the authors have developed themselves. The ways that teachers can follow in the footsteps of the authors is outlined in clearly defined steps. By drawing on previous literature, we provide seven strong claims of developing middle leadership knowledge and skill sets beyond your school. Much of this development and community development work that develops and sharpens leadership skills can be explored through online fora and social media tools. These tools allow skill development, professional learning, and exposure to a broad range of education stakeholders and groups; for future pathways in school leadership roles and leading beyond school gate.

This chapter offers Australian and international insights into leadership development and discusses how aspirant and current middle leaders can use leader and teacher professional standards to foster their professional growth. Standards help inform performance and development planning, and shape feedback and provide a framework for professional learning design. This chapter provides an overview of how systems such as New Zealand, Australia, and Scotland, among others, describe leadership in terms of standards. When used alongside an annual performance and development process, middle leaders can tap into the power of standards to continually sharpen their leadership practice and create a thriving career leading from the middle. Practical guidance is provided for middle leaders to engage with national teacher and leadership standards.