Leadership for Learning: the Cambridge Network

Leadership for Learning (LfL) is a framework and set of principles that arose from the Carpe Vitam project in which practitioners and researchers worked together to develop the practice of leadership for learning. Leadership for Learning: the Cambridge Network, based in the University of Cambridge Faculty of Education, draws together practitioners, schools and organisations concerned with these ideas. The LfL framework and principles have been used in a wide variety of contexts to frame discussions and to inform the evaluation of practice.

The Leadership for Learning Project (known as Carpe Vitam after its Swedish commissioning body) was a research and development project focusing on the process by which schools made, and then grew, the connections between learning and leadership. It was funded for three years (2002–2005) by the Wallenberg Foundation in Sweden, with further financial support from participating countries. The project was directed from the University of Cambridge in collaboration with eight different groups of university researchers and their nominated schools in eight cities: Athens, Brisbane, Copenhagen, Innsbruck, London, Oslo, Seattle, and Trenton (New Jersey). Seven countries, eight higher education institutions and 24 schools participated in exploring the connections between leadership and learning through conferences, workshops, school visits and inter-country exchanges.

The researchers did not start from a blank slate or from a neutral stance but from a set of democratic values about leadership and learning. How those values could be translated into practical strategies at school and classroom level, however, was something they planned to discover through experimentation, reflection and collective debate over the life of the project. Part way through that process they began to identify ‘principles for practice’ that would help to clarify and focus attention on the transformations in learning and leadership that were beginning to take place. These five principles were refined and developed throughout the project.

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