The everyday approaches of teachers in higher education set the stage for an academic environment, and the expectations and conduct of students soon follow such daily stances and strategies.

As a result, a postsecondary institution’s culture and core values are created and cultivated primarily by teachers. Specifically, teachers who step into leadership positions. These individuals set a school up for success, and help to drive it forward. This is what makes teacher leadership so important.

What is Teacher Leadership?

Teacher leadership can be defined as a set of skills demonstrated by educators who influence beyond their classrooms. They facilitate positive development among policies, programs, school performance, colleagues, and communities.

Teacher leadership is less about power and more about presence. Leading teachers have the ability to be informative, inspiring, and impactful, regardless of title or institutional rank.

With the courage to confront change head-on and heed any obstacles along the way, teacher leadership goes beyond the classroom curriculum. It carries an unwavering passion for the school’s mission and message.

Teacher leaders also collaboratively encourage their higher ed colleagues to make meaningful progress in their profession. Effective educators continually push to self-improve — they commonly seek feedback, are professional and reflective in practice, initiate action, and learn from any applicable oversights.

Someone with a Master’s in Teacher Leadership, for instance, prioritizes solving problems and listening to all perspectives. Likewise, graduates of a Master of Education (M.Ed.) in

Teacher Leadership program know the pivotal value of being authentic, empathetic, and equitable.

Teacher leaders are also curious communicators and are viewed as open, reliable, respectful, and trustworthy among their colleagues.

Educational leaders build safe and effective learning environments, strive to provide a high-quality student experience, and ultimately expand learner achievement and excellence.

Teacher Leadership: Lending a Hand

Teacher leadership occurs when educators ignite ideas into a specific action — providing input at meetings, sharing best practices, and intuitively mentoring others.

Those taking on teacher leadership roles may find themselves:

• Authoring professional blogs, books, journal articles, or online publications
• Being a public speaker for professional conferences or public forums
• Coaching classroom management techniques
• Contacting elected officials regarding issues in education
• Directing significant discussions about culturally responsive teaching and social justice
• Dissecting student achievement data for educational effectiveness
• Focusing on individual, collaborative, and school-wide enhancements
• Reviewing contemporary educational research, theories, and trends
• Serving on a school or district committee or board
• Modeling modern academic approaches for fellow teachers, or
• Writing grant proposals in pursuit of additional funds

Lessons in Universal Design for Learning (UDL)

For prospective and seasoned teacher leadership, adopting instructional frameworks like Universal Design for Learning (UDL), as taught by Goodwin University, helps to generate goal-directed students through innovative and interactive curricula.

UDL embraces individual learning differences and reduces and removes students’ cognitive, intellectual, organizational, and physical barriers to success.

Universal Design for Learning is based on cognitive neuroscience and applies technology and transparency to teaching. UDL combines elements of engagement, representation, and expression and cultivates an inclusive learning community — an essential component of teaching leadership.

Making an Impact: Investing in Teacher Leadership

Traditionally, teachers pursuing advancements in their profession might hang up their instruction hat and consider a career in administration, or becoming the head of an educational program.

However, teacher leadership capacities are changing, and academic decision-making authorities are adjusting accordingly. Today, professionals interested in continuing to teach can still instruct at the front of the classroom while maintaining an influential voice in a school’s future.

Teacher leaders of tomorrow and postsecondary institutions must aptly invest in teacher leadership development to demonstrate commitment to long-term higher education improvements.

Graduate School & Teacher Leadership Success

Hiring teachers with a master’s degree in Education or enrolling in a graduate degree in Teacher Leadership can propel positive impacts on postsecondary institutions as well as professional prospects and earning potential for teacher leaders.

Convenient and career-focused schools make earning a master’s degree accessible and affordable. Educational institutions like Goodwin University even took the ease of the Teacher Leadership admissions process a step further by eliminating commonly required GRE test scores, saving students additional expenses.

Through a blend of live and independent virtual learning sessions, flexible postsecondary programs, like Goodwin’s M.Ed. Teacher Leadership, enable future leaders to complete their graduate degree entirely online in as few as 15 months part-time.

From Curriculum to Future Career

A curriculum in Teacher Leadership contains compelling courses, such as:

• Contemporary issues in urban education
• Effective learning environments
• Instructional coaching
• Leading professional learning, and
• Social foundations of education, among others.

For educators who have earned their master’s in Teacher Leadership and are looking to expand their professional prospects, career options include roles as a corporate trainer, curriculum specialist, educational administrator, school principal, university professor, and much more.

Are you ready to instruct an inclusive and innovative classroom?

Click here to learn more about a meaningful career in teaching leadership!