A Look Back
Five goals for teacher leadership
By Celine Coggins & Kate McGovern
April 2014, pp. 15-21
In just about any context, the notion of leadership roles for teachers gains easy support. Yet the concept has been slow to take hold “in either a strategic or a systematic way,” Celine Coggins and Kate McGovern write in their 2014 Kappan article. “For teacher leadership to have staying power, it must prove itself to be genuinely influential — to matter more than other strategies for improving schools,” they argue. To do that, teacher leaders must meet the most pressing needs facing the American education system: They must support improved student outcomes schoolwide and increase access to highly effective teachers for high-need students. The role must also extend the careers of teachers looking for growth opportunities, expand the influence of effective teachers on their peers, and ensure a role for teachers as leaders in education policy decisions. “When we treat teacher leadership as a tool for fixing the critical challenges facing education and we measure its effect on those challenges, then teacher leadership becomes more than a nice idea,” write Coggins and McGovern, drawing upon their experiences working for the education nonprofit Teach Plus. “It becomes an indispensable avenue for school improvement and building a high-performing, sustainable teacher force for the next generation.”
Conversation Piece
This issue of Kappan focuses on teacher leadership. Use these questions to reflect on the topic with your colleagues:
- What specific leadership roles are available to teachers in your school or district?
- What are the benefits of teacher leadership opportunities, for teachers, students, and schools?
- What are some of the challenges in creating leadership opportunities for teachers?
- Of the models discussed in this issue, such as Experts Down the Hall, AI leaders, coaches, and department heads, which is most appealing to you and why?
- What’s one thing your school could do to more effectively promote teacher leadership?
PDK members have access to discussion guides related to specific articles in each issue of Kappan. Log in to the member portal and access the discussion guides at https://members.pdkintl.org/PDK_PLT_Member_Discussion_Questions.
Research Notes
Survey: Teachers open to innovative staffing
Job satisfaction is improving among teachers, but the majority say they are open to trying new staffing models to better serve students. The 2025 Voices from the Classroom survey, conducted by the teacher-led nonprofit Educators for Excellence, shows that while 91% of teachers are “somewhat” or “very” satisfied in their job, only 19% would recommend the profession to others. Meanwhile, roughly three-quarters of teachers stated they were in favor of adopting innovative staffing practices that would break away from the traditional one-teacher, one-classroom model.
SOURCE: Educators for Excellence. (2025). Voices from the Classroom: A Survey of America’s Educators.
“I see my job as a profession, and I want to be treated as a professional.” — Eric Lewis, science teacher in the San Francisco Unified School District, quoted in a March Education Week article on boosting morale.
Teacher-leader initiative produces results in West Texas
A new approach to staffing produced consistent gains in reading and math for students in grades four through seven, according to a new policy brief from Texas Tech University. Between 2021 and 2024, researchers studied the effects of the Opportunity Culture (OC) initiative in Ector County Independent School District in West Texas. The program offered paid residencies for highly effective educators — referred to as multi-classroom leaders (MCLs) — who worked both alongside colleagues and in a coaching capacity. Under the model, these educators were held accountable for student achievement in all of the classrooms served by their team of teachers. Over four years, students in classrooms with MCLs at the helm saw the largest gains in achievement. “On average, MCLs supported additional learning gains of 6-13 months in reading and 6-9 months in math when compared to non-OC teachers in the district,” researchers noted. Additionally, students assigned to classrooms with team teachers who had been mentored by the MCLs saw moderate improvements in achievement and the OC program was found to have a positive impact on the district as a whole. “Over time, the teachers not participating in OC schools also showed improved effectiveness, which could indicate that embedded components of the OC program (e.g., collaboration, sharing practices, etc.) benefitted teachers campus-wide,” the report states.
SOURCE: Kirksey, J., Gottlieb, J., Wiseman, A., Reed, B., Lansford, T., & Robison, E. (2026). Evaluating Opportunity Culture: Improving Student Achievement through Strategic Staffing in West Texas. Center for Innovative Research in Change, Leadership, and Education.
Removing barriers to reimagine education
Teachers are ready for a change, according to a 2024 guide from the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ). Surveys show that educators are increasingly interested in staffing strategies that would create a “more innovative, collaborative profession,” but changing the structure of schools will require action at the state and district levels. Strategies listed in the NCTQ report include creating larger classes led by teams of teachers and tapping highly qualified educators to take on the role of supervising new teachers. But very real barriers stand in the way. In five states, class size limits are immutable. Thirteen states don’t allow teachers to formally observe other teachers as part of a mandated job performance evaluation. Another 11 states restrict districts from using team outcomes to judge teacher effectiveness. State leaders, district leaders, educator preparation programs, and advocates all have a role in removing barriers and reimagining the education profession, according to the NCTQ guide. “(O)ur traditional classroom model…isn’t working, making it difficult for schools to find and keep great teachers, which ultimately hurts student learning,” it notes.
SOURCE: National Council on Teacher Quality. (2024). Reimagining the Teaching Role: How Strategic Staffing Can Attract and Retain Effective Teachers.
Teacher perceptions of leadership roles
It’s not enough to just create teacher leadership positions. Even in states that have embraced the structure, research shows there is room for improvement. In Georgia, one of 17 U.S. states to offer a specific teacher-leader certification, a 2026 study found that the depth and breadth of leadership opportunities open to educators is viewed very differently by teachers in instructional roles versus administrators in supervisory roles. Survey data shows that classroom educators view the leadership opportunities for teachers as much more limited in availability and in impact than administrators do. “Having formalized teacher leadership standards and licensure programs is only a first step,” researchers noted. “…(T)hese opportunities should represent meaningful work with compensation, not just additional labor under the guise of distributed leadership.”
SOURCE: Keese, J., Neal, G., & Terry, K. (2026). Who can lead schools? Differences in perceived teacher leadership opportunity in Georgia (USA). Journal of School Leadership, 36 (1), 92-115.
“I became a teacher leader because I wanted to impact more than just my students. I was experiencing success in my classroom, and I wanted to see that across my school and district. I wanted to be a part of the change process to raise student achievement district-wide. As a teacher leader, I get to build the capacity of everyone.” — Latonzia Beavers, master teacher at Natchitoches Parish Schools, Louisiana, quoted in a November 2025 blog post on school improvement published by the National Institute for Excellence in Teaching.
The distributed leadership balancing act
Distributed leadership is a popular option for schools looking to leverage the expertise of classroom teachers and increase opportunities for professional growth. Under the structure, individuals across an organization take ownership of core leadership tasks and responsibilities, including decision making. When effective, distributed leadership can increase collaboration and empower staff. But new research suggests some of those benefits can be undermined if teachers and administrators lack a shared understanding of how work and power are distributed. Drawing upon survey data from teachers and principals at 165 U.S. middle schools, researchers found that the two groups of educators had differing views on the levels of autonomy extended to teachers. Specifically, researchers noted that while teachers’ perceptions of distributed leadership were the strongest predictors of work satisfaction, “when principals overestimated distributed leadership compared to teachers, teacher autonomy declined.”
SOURCE: Wiens, P.D., Vongkulluksn, V., & Pan, H.-L.W. (2025). Distributed leadership: Teachers’ and principals’ perceptions match and the association with teacher work satisfaction and autonomy. AERA Open, 11.
Professional authority and team-based staffing as retention factors
Educators involved in a team-teaching initiative that offered increased decision-making authority were less likely to leave their school or district, according to a new study. The findings were based on the experiences of teachers in Mesa Public Schools, the largest district in Arizona, and offer evidence that new staffing models can positively influence teacher satisfaction and reduce attrition. The model in question, called the Next Education Workforce (NEW) initiative, was developed at Arizona State University and is currently in use in over 150 schools in Arizona, California, and other states. “Our findings…suggest that the NEW model of team-based staffing is related to increased retention of teachers and that an essential component of the NEW model is the degree to which teachers are able to wield professional-like authority in regard to educational decisions,” researchers noted. “The ultimate goal is to improve the performance, job satisfaction, and retention of teachers and, in turn, student motivation and learning.”
SOURCE: Ingersoll, R., Audrain, L., & Laski, M. (June 2025). Team-Based Staffing, Teacher Authority, and Teacher Turnover. Center on Reinventing Public Education.
This article appears in the Summer 2026 issue of Kappan, Vol. 107, No. 7-8.
