Research on teacher leadership in Turkiye: A scoping review

Teacher leadership is a critical element that has the potential to transform schools, promote professional learning, and increase student achievement. This alternative school management model, which envisions teachers taking active roles not only in classroom practices but also in issues concerning the school as a whole, is increasingly gaining attention in both international and national literature. However, the lack of knowledge about the general characteristics of this rapidly growing literature poses a problem, especially for new research. While efforts to fill this gap in the international literature are increasing, the general characteristics of studies conducted on teacher leadership in Türkiye and the gaps that stand out are still unknown. At this point, the current research aims to reveal the current status of the relevant literature by comprehensively examining studies focusing on teacher leadership in the context of Türkiye. This study, which is based on the scope review framework of Arksey and O'Malley (2005), aims to systematically analyze what the characteristics of teacher leadership are, how the concept of teacher leadership is defined, what the aims of the studies conducted are, and which variables the concept of teacher leadership is examined with. The literature review and article selection process of the study is reported transparently in line with the PRISMA flow chart. In this context, qualitative, quantitative, mixed method and theoretical articles on teacher leadership in the Web of Science, Scopus, ERIC and Dergi Park databases were scanned and examined according to the specified criteria. Basic qualitative content analysis and descriptive statistics methods were used in the analysis process. The findings show that studies on teacher leadership in Türkiye have started to increase especially since 2010, studies conducted with quantitative methods are in the majority, teachers are frequently preferred as participants, findings regarding the definition of teacher leadership show that the concept is not defined with a clear and theoretical framework in most studies, but instead is addressed indirectly through some practical roles, and these roles are grouped in three main groups. In addition, it is quite remarkable that studies focusing on the relationship between teacher leadership and different variables have an important place in the literature. This study reveals research trends in the field of teacher leadership in Türkiye by explaining various aspects of teacher leadership in the context of Türkiye. In addition, it draws attention to theoretical and methodological gaps in the literature and aims to guide future research.