This symposium contributes to decades of international research designed to understand and improve leadership practices across educational sites. In times where uncertainty for educational development prevails, the work of a group of educators described as middle leaders, whose remit is largely to support professional learning, brings hope to teaching development. Scholarship shows that the study of educational leadership is predominantly focused on the work, characteristics, and practices of school principals (Gurr & Drysdale, 2013). Yet among the web of leadership practices (Nehez et al., 2022), the leading and development practices of middle leaders are less prominent as a dedicated focus of research (Forde et al., 2019). Across the globe, middle leaders are increasingly recruited to support site-based education development of teachers in primary and secondary schools, preschools, and universities (Grootenboer et al., 2020; Vangrieken et al., 2017). Site-based education development, a term coined by Kemmis et al. (2024), is a central notion for capturing the actual situatedness (needs and circumstances of practitioners) that influence the practices for leading professional learning. This symposium draws together research conducted in Australia, New Zealand and Sweden seeking to redress the more limited body of research focused on middle leadership, particularly as it relates to the productivity of communicative practices employed when middle leaders lead education development in their own settings.

Middle leaders are variously defined across different educational jurisdictions and international contexts (Lipscomb et al., 2023); for example, they are known as first teachers or development leaders in Sweden, or instructional leaders, instructional teachers or middle leaders in Australia and New Zealand. Among their designated roles, it is generally understood that a main responsibility is to facilitate professional development and curriculum change initiatives (Rönnerman et al., 2018). In this symposium, presenters consider middle leaders as those educators responsible for leading, teaching, communicating and collaborating with teams of colleagues as they manage and facilitate professional development among their colleagues (Grootenboer et al., 2020). As previous research has shown, as middle leaders lead the learning of others, the framing and focus of their roles and responsibilities shift responsively across their leading practices requiring different relational intensities as they work alongside teaching colleagues and senior leadership (Edwards-Groves et al., 2023). This heightens the research attention needed to illuminate the sociality, so communicative interactional imperatives, of middle leading practices.

Capitalising on the ‘practice turn’ in education (Kemmis et al., 2014), the papers in this symposium utilise practice theories to explore the nature and influence of middle leaders’ communicative practices as they engage in their leading work. Broad questions for the collection of papers consider the relationship between middle leading practices (what actually happens), the sociality (the intersubjective and interpersonal), the situatedness (the site-ontological responsiveness) and the enabling and constraining conditions (or practice architectures) which influence the day-to-day practices of middle leaders. Practice theories attend assiduously to the site in both existential and ontological terms as being sited (in actual places where things happen), not just as a location in an abstract and universal matrix of space-time (Kemmis et al., 2014, pp. 214-215). In this light, the papers aim to show how middle leaders leading the practice development of their colleagues recognise and respond to the local contingencies ‘at work’ in the site. This reciprocally requires a theory of practice that treats middle leading practices as situated, socially, dialogically, ontologically and temporally constituted. This view of practices is important for considering, as the papers in this symposium do, ways the communication practices enacted by middle leaders are comprised of practices that promote and embody dialogue, relationality and responsivity.

Edwards-Groves, C., et al. (2023). Middle leading practices of facilitation, mentoring and coaching for teacher development: A focus on intent and relationality. International Journal of Education Policy and Leadership, 19(1), 1-20. Forde, C., et al. (2019). Evolving policy paradigms of middle leadership in Scottish and Irish education: implications for middle leadership professional development. School Leadership & Management, 39 (3-4), 297-314. Grootenboer, P., Edwards-Groves, C. & Rönnerman, K. (2020). Middle Leadership in Schools: A practical guide for leading learning. Routledge. Gurr, D., & Drysdale, L. (2013). Middle‐level secondary school leaders: Potential, constraints and implications for leadership preparation and development. Journal of Educational Administration, 51(1), 55–71 Kemmis, S., et al. (2014). Changing Practices, Changing Education. Springer. Lipscombe, K., Tindall-Ford, S., & Lamanna, J. (2023). School middle leadership: A systematic review. Educational Management Administration & Leadership, 51(2), 270-288. Nehez, J., Sülau, V., & Olin, A. (2022). A web of leading for professional learning: Leadership from a decentring perspective. Journal of educational administration and history, 55 (1), 23-38. Rönnerman, K., Edwards-Groves, C., & Grootenboer, P. (2018). Att leda från mitten - lärare driver professionell utveckling [trans: Leading from the middle - Teachers driving professional development]. Lärarförlaget. Vangrieken, L., et al. (2017). Teacher communities as a context for professional development: A systematic review. Teaching and Teacher Education, 61, 47–59.