The complexities of public education today require new, distributed models of school leadership in which teachers play a central role. The most effective teachers assume leadership roles as instructors and professional colleagues. In this article, we propose a framework for developing teacher leadership that consists of four intersecting domains: instrumental, intrapersonal, interpersonal, and organizational. These domains are mediated by the principal's beliefs, social context, organizational culture, work tasks, and district philosophy. In our framework, developing teacher leadership begins at the level of individual expertise and progresses outward across the layers of a school organization. Guided by the principal and the development of instructional expertise, a teacher's leadership skill emerges through increased exposures to boundary-crossing experiences within the school organization.
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