Exploring the Concept of Teacher Leadership through a Document Analysis in the Australian Context

This paper focuses on a document analysis for an Australian case study, which contributes to a larger international study on teacher leadership. The aim of this paper is to ascertain how teacher leadership is understood and conceptualised from an Australian documentary perspective spanning the national, state, regional, and local education administrative levels. A document analysis framework stipulated by the larger study identified the attributes of teacher leadership. Twenty-one documents were analysed and the attributes in relation to five considerations impacting teacher leadership are discussed. Results indicated differences of dominant attributes across each of the levels: however, accountability and advocacy are consistently represented. Accountability filters through all four levels. The system is beginning to advocate and acknowledge pathways to leadership. At the state level, teacher leadership is strengthened through professional and collaborative practices. However, this paper suggests this is not consistently evident at the regional and local levels due to a number of pertinent organisational issues.