The purpose of this research project is to examine professional learning communities in six Canadian French-language elementary schools at different stages of development, in order to gain a better understanding of the factors influencing their acceptance and progression of this type of functioning. This research also examines the links between these factors at the various stages. The primary data collection tool employed is a one-hour semi-structured interview with each participant, thus allowing to identify each participating school’s level of development as a professional learning community and to clarify the underlying factors that have a positive impact on this type of functioning. The interview plan, composed of themes relevant to this research project, is structured according to the Seidman model (1998). The schools were classified according to the three stages of development identified in the PLCOG grid from Leclerc, Moreau and Lépine (2009), namely the initiation, implementation and integration stages, using the seven indicators found in the professional literature. This study suggests certain dominant factors particularly for schools in the initiation and integration stages. Recommendations are presented to better assist school administrators in supporting their teaching staff as a professional learning community therefore increasing academic success through distributed pedagogical leadership.