Principal Leadership Practices for Supporting Teacher Collaboration and Collective Teacher Efficacy: A Random Intercept Cross-Lagged Panel Model

Teacher collaboration and collective teacher efficacy are important predictors of various factors at the school, teacher, and classroom levels (e.g., school climate, job satisfaction, student achievement). However, little is known about the determinants of teacher collaboration and collective teacher efficacy. Based on assumptions drawn from social capital theory, we posit that principals are in a pivotal position to shape teachers’ work environments by providing school-based structures for collaboration, thereby enhancing teachers’ actual collaboration and their collective efficacy. Moreover, there is limited evidence on the dynamics of a school’s social capital, which includes teacher collaboration and collective teacher efficacy. Using longitudinal survey data from 1,112 teachers in Germany, collected on three measurement occasions over two and a half years, this study estimates a random intercept cross-lagged panel model to investigate the temporal relationships between principals’ leadership practices, teacher collaboration, and collective teacher efficacy. Our results suggest a temporal association between principal leadership and collective teacher efficacy, mediated through teacher collaboration. Additionally, we find a reciprocal temporal relationship between teacher collaboration and collective teacher efficacy. We contribute evidence on the causal relationship between teacher collaboration and collective teacher efficacy and highlight the role of principal leadership in fostering this interplay.