ABSTRACT
This chapter identifies leadership models and practices that are helpful in the cultivating a professional learning community (PLC). It shows that leadership from the principal and senior leadership teams (SLT) was instrumental in supporting PLC cultivation. The Malaysian Education Blueprint 2013–2025 discusses PLCs as a strategy for professional development and stresses the importance of a peer-led learning culture in all schools by 2025. The chapter considers that successful change also depends on teachers commitment. It examines how teachers experienced the leadership of the principal and the SLT through the schools’ structures (including their priorities, allocation of time, and reporting and communication systems), and how they supported and enriched their professional learning and development. The chapter provides an overview of extant literature on professional learning, and on leadership practices, notably in cultivating a PLC. It also provides some vignettes that indicate the main features of the schools and their contexts, within which PLCs and leadership were experienced and reported.
