What Do We Know About Teacher Leaders' Practice and How Well Do We Know It?
Our design involves collecting, synthesizing and sharing what is known about a topic like teacher leadership in mathematics and science from the empirical research literature, from emerging MSP research, and from expert practitioners (including MSP leaders). For working with the empirical research literature, we used a process developed in our KMD project, and vetted by external reviewers, for identifying relevant studies in the literature; summarizing the studies and identifying findings; and applying standards of evidence by which we assess the strength of the study design to support the findings. For working with the emerging MSP research about teacher leadership, we collected MSP documents that described their research efforts on this topic and connected them to the relevant empirical research on the topic. For working with expert practitioner knowledge, we developed a process for collecting, confirming, and synthesizing practice-based insights on teacher leadership. This included interviews with MSP leaders, as well as multiple rounds of on-line survey/reflection, based on a Delphi panel strategy. This process for collecting practice-based insights, and for triangulating and elaborating on those insights, to develop confidence in what might be offered as "advice to the field" will be a particular focus of this break-out session.
