Comparison and evaluation of four models of teacher leadership

Abstract

The purpose of this quantitative study was to employ confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to compare the four-factor model of teacher leadership with three alternative models. The alternative models of teacher leadership include: (a) a two-factor model investigating teacher leadership as teacher-driven and principal-driven factors, (b) a three-factor model of teacher-driven factors of teacher leadership, and (c) a five-factor model in which a factor from the four factor model is split into two separate factors. While the fit indices indicated that the three-factor model provided the best model fit for the data used in this study, evaluation of CFA models of the strength and interpretability of the parameter estimates demonstrated that the four-factor model provides a better representation of teachers’ perceptions of teacher leadership in a school. Though focused on the four-factor model of teacher leadership, this study filled a theoretical gap by examining educational leadership through the lens of teacher as the cornerstone.