Characteristics of teachers as change agents
Open accessAbstract
Teachers play a key role in realizing successful changes in education. Among them are real ‘change agents’ at both classroom and school level. To obtain insights into what characterizes these teachers, an exploratory study has been conducted by interviewing external experts, principals, and teachers (n = 20). An analysis of data resulted in a picture of characteristics attributed to teachers as change agents. These characteristics pertain to lifelong learning (being eager to learn and reflective), mastery (giving guidance, being accessible, positive, committed, trustful, and self-assured), entrepreneurship (being innovative and feeling responsible), and collaboration (being collegial). The category mastery appeared to consist of the most characteristics. Within the category entrepreneurship, ‘being innovative’ was mentioned most. The characteristics mentioned apply to both the classroom and school level, but the importance of demonstrating these characteristics at the school level seems to be weighed less heavily by teachers than by experts and principals.
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Van der Heijden et al (2015) argue that teachers need to be risk takers if they are going to exercise agency.
“Van der Heijden et al (2015) argue that teachers need to be risk takers if they are going to exercise agency and in the context of high stakes accountability the force of this can be seen.”
From Teacher agency and professional learning communities; what can Learning Rounds in Scotland teach us? (2017) · cites this paper as Van der Heijden et al (2015)
The available passages identify the paper as concerning teachers as change agents, but contain no discussion of risk-taking or its relationship to teacher agency. Searches for “risk takers,” “risk,” and “agency” returned only bibliographic material, so the attributed argument cannot be verified from our copy. (LLM, conf=0.72)
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Teacher agency and professional learning communities; what can Learning Rounds in Scotland teach us?
Philpott, C., & Oates, C. (2017) · Professional Development in Education · doi:10.1080/19415257.2016.1180316 · Cited by 84 · see citing works
Examining the instructor-student collaborative partnership in an online learning community course
Ouyang, F., Chang, Y.-H., Scharber, C., Jiao, P., & Huang, T. (2020) · Instructional Science · doi:10.1007/s11251-020-09507-4 · Cited by 60 · see citing works
- Authors
- van der Heijden, H. R. M. A., Geldens, J. J. M., Beijaard, D., & Popeijus, H. L.
- Affiliations
- Hogeschool de Kempel (NL)
- Eindhoven University of Technology (NL)
- Venue
- Teachers and Teaching
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2015-06-02
- Volume
- 21
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 681-699
- ISSN
- 1354-0602 (ISSN-L)
- 1470-1278
- OpenAlex
- W2096313839
- Cited by
- 253
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 15 · 2025: 24 · 2024: 33 · 2023: 34 · 2022: 31 · 2021: 30 · 2020: 22 · 2019: 23 · 2018: 16 · 2017: 15 · 2016: 8 · 2015: 1 · 2013: 1
- FWCI
- 66.64
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- research.tue.nl
- Licence
- other-oa
- Locations
- Teachers and Teaching (publishedVersion)
- TU/e Research Portal (submittedVersion)
- TU/e Research Portal (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Funders
- Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) (023.002.035)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Education › Teacher Education and Leadership Studies
- Social Sciences › Education › Education and Teacher Training
- Social Sciences › Education › School Leadership and Teacher Performance
- Keywords
- teacher as agent of change, educational change, teacher characteristics, lifelong learning, reflective practice, mastery, teacher guidance, teacher entrepreneurship, innovation, collaboration, collegiality, school leadership, principals
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