The Leadership Qualities of Educators

Takeaways:

• Educators fulfill major leadership roles in the lives of their student followers
• Important educator behaviors mirror many common leader behaviors
• Educators influence their student followers toward meeting educational objectives and realizing the educator’s vision
   

Peter Tabichi is a teacher at the Keriko Mixed Day Secondary School in a remote village in Kenya’s Rift Valley. Despite a student-teacher ratio of 58:1, only one computer, unreliable internet and countless hardships that his students endure on a daily basis, Tabichi fosters an awe-inspiring love of science and technology in his students.

As a mentor to his school’s science club, he has led students to pursue award-winning research projects, resulting in incredible technological advancements, such as a device that can produce electricity from plants. Clearly, Tabichi is the worthy recipient of the 2019 Global Teacher Prize, considered by many to be the “Nobel Prize” of Education. [1]

Tabichi’s vision is inspiring: “Working on the front line, I have seen the promise of its young people — their curiosity, talent, their intelligence, their belief. Africa’s young people will no longer be held back by low expectations. Africa will produce scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs whose names will be one day famous in every corner of the world.”

And this vision is translated into action through education.

When we think of leaders, we often think of politicians, war heroes, executives and other figures who bring their followers together to realize a vision. However, teachers, trainers, professors and other educators alike fulfill important leadership roles.

They inspire their students to develop their knowledge and skills, build confidence and self-esteem, and empower them to put what they learn into practice. Just like the “typical” leaders people tend to think of, educators make sense of the world for their followers and influence them to realize their vision. [3]

Over the past several decades, educational leaders have attracted the attention of the scientific community. [4] In one study of trainers in the UK Armed Services, for example, researchers collected more than 1,000 incidents of effective and ineffective training episodes for the purpose of classifying instructor behaviors. The researchers concluded that 82 percent of these incidents could be reliably categorized as leadership behaviors. Specifically, effective educational leaders:

1. show, demonstrate or role model effective behaviors
2. use instructional strategies to bring students toward learning (e.g., Socratic method),
3. intellectually stimulate the students
4. provide feedback, practice and adaptation opportunities
5. engage individually with each student

provide positive reinforcement or disciplinary action where appropriate. [5]

Furthermore, just as exchanges between leaders and their followers are an important part of the popular leader-member exchange (LMX) theory, educators and students interact with one another —forming unique relationships which influence both student success and students’ perceptions of the educator. [6]

Indeed, our research on trainers at a professional development company demonstrates that the educator may be a larger influence on students’ evaluation of their training experiences than the actual content of the course itself. [7] Drawing on data from more than 10,000 trainees, we found that responses to training evaluation surveys were driven primarily by the trainer, as opposed to the course content.  Even more intriguing, we found evidence that the way the trainer teaches the material may play a large role. 

These findings have two implications for educators’ roles as leaders.  First, these evaluations could be driven by the educator’s leadership-relevant skills and abilities. For example, some educators may be more effective than others at persuading their students, so they believe that what they are learning is important and critical to know in the future. [8]

Second, there may be a darker side through which educators influence their student followers.  In pursuit of favorable ratings and evaluations, educators may engage in “edutainment” practices —focusing on the interesting or entertaining aspects of the material that are only slightly related to the content. [9] This more nefarious form of influence crafts positive perceptions of the educator, regardless of whether the student follower actually learned the material.

Although we might not always make the connection, educators are leaders.  They develop principled teaching philosophies, visions for what they want their student followers to learn and set explicit objectives for their students. They exercise influence over their student followers to realize their vision and meet learning objectives. 

As Tabichi’s story suggests, educational leadership can have a profound influence on students, making a lasting difference in their lives. Tabichi, commenting on his role as a teacher, notes, “Teaching is a deep responsibility … As teachers, we… have the power to transform society.”  [10]

References:

[1] An Interview with Peter Tabichi, Winner of the 2019 Global Teacher Prize. The World Bank, September 27, 2019. https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/education/brief/an-interview-with-peter-tabichi-winner-of-the-2019-global-teacher-prize; S. Coughlan, Kenyan Science Teacher Peter Tabichi Wins Global Prize, BBC News, March 24, 2019, https://www.bbc.com/news/business-47658803; Peter Tabichi: The 2019 Global Teacher Prize Winner, Global Teacher Prize, accessed June 1, 2020, https://www.globalteacherprize.org/winners/peter-tabichi-2019/

[2] Bennett, J. (2001, March). Trainers as leaders of learning. Training & Development, 43-44; Bess, J. L. and Goldman, P. (2001). Leadership ambiguity in universities and K-12 schools and the limits of contemporary leadership theory. The Leadership Quarterly, 12, 419-450.

[3] Berkovich, I., & Eyal, O. (2014). Educational leaders and emotions: An international review of empirical evidence 1992-2012. Review of Educational research, 85, 129-167; Hallinger, P. (2014). Reviewing reviews of research in educational leadership: An empirical assessment. Educational Administration Quarterly, 50, 539-576; Karadağ, E., Bektaş, F., Çoğaltay, N., and Yalçin, M. (2015). The effect of educational leadership on students’ achievement: A meta-analysis study. Asia Pacific Educational Review, 16, 79-93.

[4] Patrick, J., Scrase, G., Ahmed, A., & Tombs, M. (2009). Effectiveness of instructor behaviours and their relationship to leadership. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 82, 491-509.

[5] Steiner, D. D., Dobbins, G. H., & Trahan, W. A. (1991). The trainer-trainee interaction: An attributional model of training. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 12, 271-286.

[6] Glerum, D. R., Joseph, D. L., McKenny, A. F., & Fritzsche, B. A. (in press). The trainer matters: Cross-classified models of trainee reactions. Journal of Applied Psychology.

[7] Grossman, R. & Salas, E. (2011). The transfer of training: What really matters. International journal of Training and Development, 15, 103-120.

[8] Beato, G. (2015, March 19). That’s edutainment. The New York Times (p. F1); Sitzmann, T. & Johnson, S. (2014). The paradox of seduction by irrelevant details: How irrelevant information helps and hinders self-regulated learning. Learning and Individual Differences, 34, 1-11.

[9] An Interview with Peter Tabichi.