Teacher leadership: Is it related to student achievement

School reform in the state of Texas has moved schools from principal centered leadership to collaborative leadership roles for both principals and teachers. Through the process, teachers have engaged in many teacher leadership activities at the campus level. The purpose of this study was to (1) Identify through principal components analysis patterns in teacher activities outside the classroom that constitute teacher leadership in Texas elementary schools; (2) Ascertain the level of participation of Texas elementary teachers in these leadership activity components; (3) Explore the correlation between the teacher leadership activity components and elementary school student achievement; and (4) Determine which of the teacher leadership activity components possess the strongest and unique contribution to student achievement.; A review of the literature on leadership, in general, and teacher leadership provide the context for this study. The research design is quantitative explanatory and uses data gathered from a survey of Texas principals and archived Public Education Information Management System data.; Four teacher leadership components were identified: Component 1-School Improvement, Component 2-Team Impact, Component 3-Program Planning and Design, and Component 4-Positive/Community Involvement. The level of teacher involvement for School Improvement was 4.12 (SD = .69), Team Impact was 3.98 (SD = .70), Program Planning and Design was 2.96 (SD = .84), and Positive Parent/Community Involvement was 4.11 (SD = .78).; Of the four components, correlational analysis showed that Component 4-Positive Parent/Community Involvement was the only component that had a correlation to student achievement. It was significant at the p = .05 level with Reading, r = .295 (p = .00); Math, r = .236 (p = .00); and All Tests, r = .258 (p = .00).; The regression analysis revealed that on average the models explained almost 40% of the variance in the student learning variables. Specifically, the predictor variable students economically disadvantaged was found to possess the largest and unique percent of variance shared with the student learning variables after accounting for the explained variance contributed by the other four predictors. While not contributing as much as the percent of students economically disadvantaged, Component four, Positive Parent/Community Involvement, produced the next strongest relationship controlling for the other predictor variables with the student learning variables.