The promise of leadership: Policy, new teachers and leadership ambition in primary multi-academy trusts

KATHRYN SPICKSLEY, SCHOOL OF EDUCATION, UNIVERSITY OF WORCESTER, UK This paper reports on selected findings taken from a research study that explored the professional identities of early career teachers (ECTs; defined as having up to five years’ teaching experience for the purpose of this study) working in primary schools in England that were situated within a multi-academy trust (MAT). The research study explored how teachers ‘positioned’ their professional identities in response to policy discourse (Harré and van Langenhove, 1999). Gaining a better understanding of how new teachers working in primary academies related to leadership discourse was a particular focus of the study, as the expansion of the MAT model post-2010 had been positioned by policymakers as facilitating leadership opportunities for entrants to the teaching profession (DfE, 2016). Methodology The study was conducted in two phases. In the first phase, I analysed 439 policy documents broadly identified as re