Embedding Leadership in the Teaching Profession
Four leading education groups brought some of the best and brightest minds from around the country to the 2016 National Summit on Teacher Leadership in Washington, D.C. on Feb. 5-6 to turn ideas into action and empower more educators to lead their professions.
The National Education Association (NEA), along with the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSS0), and the U.S. Department of Education, organized the summit to allow participating teachers, state superintendents, and union representatives to share ideas, best practices, and examples of existing teacher-leadership efforts. Additionally, the group identified common challenges and created concrete, actionable teacher leadership plans to address them back home.
Nineteen states were represented at the summit, and included an education team from the U.S. Department of Defense.
Teachers and Leadership Not Mutually Exclusive
“[Teacher leadership] needs to be so embedded in the profession that it’s an expectation… I am supposed to lead,” said NEA President Lily Eskelsen García to the group. “It’s not separate from your routine as teachers.”
Educators and leadership is a combination that makes sense because teachers are the experts, said Aman Dhanda, a sixth grade teacher from California, now serving as a Washington Teaching Ambassador Fellow for the federal education department.
“What’s been resonating with me is that a lot of teacher leaders have felt this is the first time their voices are being heard,” said Dhanda of the teachers participating in the summit, which, she adds, is intended to “make sure [teachers] always ask for a Embedding Leadership in the Teaching Profession - NEA Today:
