Making Space for Teacher Leadership: A World Language Teacher Educator Perspective.

This article examines how world language (WL) teacher educators in the United States perceive and cultivate teacher leadership within pre-service teacher education programs (TEPs). Although leadership development is not typically a prioritized program goal due to competing demands such as pedagogy and certification standards, the study found that educators integrate leadership implicitly through modeling, explicit discussions, program development, and providing professional opportunities for pre-service teachers (PSTs). The research highlights that teacher leadership—defined as an identity and set of actions to enact positive educational change beyond formal roles—can be effectively fostered alongside other program objectives. The findings suggest that WL TEPs could more explicitly and intentionally embed leadership development to better prepare future teachers for the challenges and advocacy roles in the WL profession.