THE EXPLORATION OF TEACHER LEADERSHIP AT SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN KAZAKHSTAN
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Date
2016-07
Authors
Khoroshash, Aidar
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Graduate School of Education
Abstract
Despite the vast amount of research about educational leadership found in international
literature, Kazakhstan has not yet developed an extensive discussion about leadership in
education, including teacher leadership. This study explores teacher leadership at secondary
schools in Kazakhstan, looking specifically at how important it is for Kazakhstani education
to promote its teachers as leaders. Various stakeholders from two local schools such as
principals, vice-principals, teachers and students were surveyed and interviewed to identify
their perceptions of teacher leadership in both theory and practice, and also to understand
what either facilitates or challenges teacher leadership in this country. Because Kazakhstani
education is still connected to its Soviet Union heritage, the interviewed administrators and
teachers were questioned about whether a typical Soviet school would have any elements of
leadership, in order to relate them to the current situation in independent Kazakhstan.
An analysis of the main findings yielded the stakeholdersā own explanations that
teacher leadership is a rare case in schools, since teachers lack the chance to extend their
understanding of leadership. As a result of such a poor level of knowledge, teachers miss an
opportunity to develop leaderful practices in and outside their schools because of the topdown
tradition and highly hierarchical relationships still inherent in the system. The `Soviet`
leadership, often associated with `high moral values` by veteran teachers, remains deeply
embedded in the minds of many, while others blame Communism for its false proclamations
and ideology in education.
The findings ultimately suggested that re-orienting the current system from top-down
to shared governance should both reconcile the schools with the Ministry of Education and
empower teachers in Kazakhstan to actively participate and voluntarily commit themselves to
change and reform in the country. With such major implications drawn from the findings, this
project will contribute to current and future research on teacher leadership in Kazakhstan.
Description
Keywords
Type of access: Restricted, perceptions, schools, Soviet ideology, stakeholders, teacher leadership
Citation
Khoroshash, A.N. (2016). The exploration of teacher leadership at secondary schools in Kazakhstan. Graduate School of Education