This contribution presents an exploratory study focusing on the professional identity of middle leaders in schools and on the training methods employed to support their professional development. The study, in an effort to contribute, through the consideration of the direct voice of teachers, to the contemporary debate on the role of middle leaders at schools and the training models to support their professional skills (Harris et al., 2019; Craig, 2021), specifically focuses on the training project "PRO.VA.LO" and its impact as perceived by teachers who had a coordinating role in it. The "PRO.VA.LO" initiative, overseen by the Regional Scholastic Office of Lombardy in collaboration with the Department of Human Sciences at the University of Milan-Bicocca, involved fifteen school networks and was implemented between March of 2019 and April of 2021. The aim of the initiative was twofold: a) to support the professional development of teachers with regard to learning assessment practices; b) to facilitate school middle leaders in the development of skills necessary for designing and coordinating training programs for their colleagues. 

Existing research on innovations and leadership in school organization underline that not only the role of the school director (Harris, 2004) but also those of middle leaders contribute to school effectiveness (Farchi, Tubin, 2019)  as well as to the transformation of the school as a community of practitioners. The latter contribution is of greater relevance here. In continuity with this notion, the current contribution aims to emphasize the crucial role played by those figures in creating conditions for the professional development of their colleagues and in facilitating the transformative processes in schools as it is carried out from the inside (Bondioli, Savio, 2018).

In the Italian school system, unlike in other countries, the role of school middle leaders is not well defined, neither in terms of employment agreements nor in terms of professional duties and functions to be assigned by school directors (Agrati, 2018). These figures, however, were introduced into the school organization and their responsibilities have been “formally” defined since the 1980s as “objective functions” and “system figures” (Pirola, 2015). In recent years, the introduction of so-called “school-autonomy”, initially outlined in legislative act DPR 275/1999 and reinforced later by the “La Buona Scuola” school organization reforms (107/2005), has, on an institutional level, further urged schools to define the professional organization and to define the duties related to middle leadership in order to make this role effective. Nevertheless, there has been little improvement (Romeo, 2017) and middle leaders have yet to find their place in the professional landscape of the school system. 

International studies have resulted in a rich bibliography on this topic (Harris & Michelle, 2010; Fleming, 2013; Leask & Terrell, 2014; Hallinger & Chen, 2015; Kiat et al., 2016). Of particular interest are are literature reviews that attempt to categorize the different roles of middle leaders within schools (Wenner & Campbell, 2017; De Nobile, 2018; Harris et al., 2019) and a large body of theoretical contributions and empirical research focused on more detailed objects: curriculum and instructional leadership (Kiat, Heng & Lim-Ratnam, 2016), subject leaders (Bennet, 2005; Friedman, 2011); middle leaders in secondary schools (Bennet et al., 2007; Fleiming, 2013; Irvine & Brundrett, 2016); training and support strategies for professional development (Carter, 2016; Donitsa-Schmidt & Zuzovsky, 2018); and the perception of professional identity (Koh et al., 2011; Thorpe & Bennett-Powell, 2014). 

The current study is solely connected with the last two areas of research and serves to offer an empirical contribution to the debate on the training programs administered to middle leaders on professional development.

The PRO.VA.LO initiative involved four hundred teachers belonging to the participating school networks who were all taking part in a training program on learning assessment. For each school network four teachers were designated to enroll in a separate training program on design and coordinative skills for school middle leaders. This contribution focuses on this second level of the PRO.VA.LO initiative by way of an evaluation process related to this latter training program. The aim of the research is to explore the impact of the training program as perceived by those sixty teachers. The study, qualitative-based and characterized by an exploratory purpose (Lumbelli 1980), falls within the parameters the ecological paradigm and phenomenological epistemology (Denzin & Lincoln, 2011) and was carried out through two main channels: a) ex-ante and ex-post questionnaires and semi-structured interviews conducted at the conclusion of the project. The present research focuses solely on the data collected by way of twenty in-depth interviews conducted with school middle leaders in order to collect their points of view regarding two main topics: a) professional identity as school middle leaders; b) learning developed through the training program. The research is consistent with the participatory approach to educational research and the notion of giving value, in theoretical terms, to the practical knowledge of teachers (Mortari, 2011). The participants are twenty primary and middle school teachers from schools in the Lombardy region. Teachers were selected based on purposive sampling (Gentles et al., 2015), according to their participation in the training program and willingness to take part in the study. In accordance with applicable regulations, teachers contacted were informed in advance regarding the purpose and methods of data collection and agreed to participate in the study by expressing informed consent. Semi-structured interviews (Sità, 2012) were conducted, audio-recorded, and transcribed verbatim. The textual data collected was analyzed according to an inductive, bottom up approach, following the criteria of reflexive thematic analysis as codified by Braun & Clarke (2006; 2019) for the purpose of descriptively reporting the meanings and perceptions of the interviewees. The data analysis engaged the two authors in a constant inter-subjective comparison along all stages of the analysis. This, along with the use of Nvivo 12 Plus software, made the organization and coding systematic and comparable, thus making the analytical choices adopted "transparent" (Lewins & Silver, 2009; Pagani, 2020).

As regards professional identity, the results obtained revealed four recurrent themes: a) critical aspects in professional recognition from colleagues; b) unconditional delegation by the school director; c) the organizational definition of the assigned; d) a sense that progress is made by trial and error. Three recurrent themes emerged in relation to the perceived impact of the training: a) the transition from informality to a structured approach in reenvisioning one's role; b) an awareness of the need to analyze training needs in order to identify shared training objectives; c) the cyclical relationship between teaching skills and middle leadership skills. The evidence gathered related to the perception of professional changes indicates a need for the consideration of ongoing rather than sporadic support based on the analysis of and reflection on the teachers' second level professional practices (theory-practice balance). Furthermore, the data reveals the need to rationalize the individual or collegial dimension with which to prepare the training programs for middle leaders, particularly in the light of the growing need to offer schools strategies for collective contributions that go in the direction of creating practices. However, further research is necessary in order to better understand and distinguish the different stages of the development of professional skills necessary to becoming an experienced middle leader. Finally, training programs must be created for middle leadership and, to that end, the type of training offered by universities to in-service teachers must be reevaluated.

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