Conference Agenda

The concept of the ‘expert teacher’ has is an increasingly global phenomenon with many advanced systems investing in a formal designation, this is partly explained by education systems profound need to recruit and retain the best teachers, providing them with a career structure, maintaining their classroom impact and, in some designations, developing other teachers in the system. This research closely examines the purposes and structures of these evolving models and their successes and challenges in each national context and it traces global influences and the challenges of governance and political control of such designations. It also analyses 3 relatively new models ‘The Extended Teacher’ from Norway, ‘The Chartered Teacher’ in England and the Korean ‘Master Teacher’.

The concept of the ‘expert teacher’ has become an increasingly global phenomenon with many advanced systems investing in a formal designation. This phenomenon is partly explained by the need systems have to recruit and retain the best teachers and to provide them with a meaningful and high status career structure that maintains their impact in the classroom and, in some designations, on the development of other teachers in the system. There are many examples of the phenomenon with the Advanced Skills Teacher [AST] in Australia [over 30 years] and The Highly Accomplished Teacher [HAT]in the USA [28 years] being the most established. However some models have already come and gone – the AST in England 1997-2013, the Chartered Teacher in Scotland only lasted 5 years. There are new developments, the Chartered teacher in England, launched by the Chartered College of teaching in 2017 and the Highly Accomplished Teacher in Australia, now 4 years in development, Singapore is evolving an elaborate structure of Leading and Master teachers with several career pathways. Each of these models has been designed for the local system with different models of governance and control for example the totally independent National Board for Professional Teaching Standards in the USA, or the completely politically managed system in Singapore.

This research examines the purposes and structures of these evolving models and their successes and challenges in each national context. It traces global influences, for example the adoption of the the HAT designation in Australia, being adapted from the USA, the Chartered model beginning in England just as it is abolished in Scotland. These changes are part of the challenge of governance and political control of such designations and their relative stability or fragility.

Ontologically, the research adopts a critical realist perspective examining the expert teacher concept as fundamentally concerned with structural, systemic improvement, a potentially emancipatory project for the agentive teaching profession in each system. Epistemologically it adopts a phenomenological stance to understanding ‘expert teaching’ as a designation. It also examines the structures and stratifications in the system and the context of each society that may enable teacher emancipation or obstruct and diminish it. The analysis of 3 relatively new models ‘The Extended Teacher’ from Norway, ‘The Chartered Teacher’ in England and the Korean ‘Master Teacher’, traces the extent to which they are influenced by previous models in other jurisdictions and reveals that there are both global trends and local adaptations. There is also evidence of what may be deemed ‘expert teacher cultures’, that is how the ideologies infused in education systems dominate the character of what it means to be an expert teacher. Much of this ‘character’ is revealed through analysing the descriptors and standards used to define the teacher role and behaviours.

Objective: This study aims to explore how Chinese volunteer teachers enact their leadership. Generally, volunteer teachers are those who support teaching in underdeveloped areas without payment or with little payment (Zhou & Shang, 2011). This teacher group has been and is making immeasurable contributions to students’ learning, regional educational resources’ balance, and educational equality in underdeveloped areas, especially areas where education development lags (Duthilleul, 2005). Governments and non-governmental organizations in some countries and regions (e.g., China, America, and Africa) also constantly organize and implement diverse volunteer teaching programmes to exert the leadership of volunteer teachers (Koerner et al., 2008). Under the efforts of volunteer teachers, these public welfare activities positively influenced students’ development and social well-being. However, a few researchers paid attention to volunteer teaching activities, not to mention how volunteer teachers enact their leadership and the corresponding implications (Zhou & Shang, 2011).

Research Question: 1) how do volunteer teachers enact their leadership in a Chinese underdeveloped area? 2) what are the outcomes of their leadership’s enactments?

Theoretical Framework: Although it is challenging to gain consensus on defining teacher leadership (Wenner & Campbell, 2017), this study found two main trends in conceptualizing this term: competence- and interaction-oriented. Competence-oriented teacher leadership emphasizes that teacher leaders can engage colleagues in experimentation and examination of effective practices for students’ learning” (Wasley, 1991, p.170). However, interaction-oriented teacher leadership focuses on the relationship between teacher leaders and contexts. One high-incited definition is that “teacher leadership is the process by which teachers, individually or collectively, influence their colleagues, principals, and other members of school communities to improve teaching and learning practices with the aim of increased student learning and achievement (York-Barr & Duke, 2004).” Whether competence-oriented or interaction-oriented teacher leadership, teacher leaders tend to balance the relationship with different contexts. For example, to encourage teachers to master a specific teaching ability, teacher leaders would cooperate with teachers to explore this strategy and explain its benefits (Sinha & Hanuscin, 2017). As a result of teacher leadership’s enactment, teacher leaders’ dispositions and abilities in teaching and learning would be strengthened (Landa & Donaldson, 2022). Also, teacher leadership’s enactment could contribute to achieving educational goals in various sub-contexts (Akiba et al., 2019; Campbell et al., 2022).

However, there is a gap between the research and practice of volunteer teachers’ leadership (Zhou & Shang, 2011). Although many volunteer teaching activities are conducted, and volunteer teachers play a non-negligible role in alleviating educational inequality in the world (Koerner et al., 2008), these teachers’ leadership has not been thoroughly analyzed and discussed in the research field. This gap is, to some extent, detrimental to the improvement of volunteer teaching programmes and the preparation of volunteer teachers.

Therefore, this study was rooted in the Chinese context to research the enactment of volunteer teachers’ leadership in self, interpersonal, institutional, and socio-cultural sub-contexts. China has been and is now making national efforts to realize modernization, including getting rid of poverty in education, accompanied by apparent challenges and changes (Xi, 2022). For example, the central government encouraged high-quality teachers as volunteers to support the development of students, teachers, and schools in remote areas (Xi, 2022). These volunteer teachers need to coordinate and balance their relationship with self, interpersonal, institutional, and socio-cultural sub-contexts, and on this basis, exert their leadership to improve the educational quality in schools and regions. Thus, the Chinese context could help me understand volunteer teachers’ leadership from various perspectives.