📄 Abstract
Teacher leadership and continuous professional development (CPD) are increasingly shaped by competency-based standards, performance assessment, and rapidly changing educational contexts. However, such approaches may give limited attention to the ethical, reflective, and inner dimensions of teachers’ professional growth. This study explores Buddhist ethical self-cultivation as a philosophical foundation for cultivating teacher leadership and continuous professional development. Drawing on the Buddhist concepts of bhāvanā (cultivation), sīla (ethical conduct), samādhi (mental discipline), and paññā (wisdom), the study develops a conceptual framework linking ethical self-cultivation with teacher leadership and professional growth. The framework further incorporates the Five Precepts, mindfulness, the Noble Eightfold Path, brahmavihāras, kalyāṇamitta, anicca, and anattā to examine ethical, relational, reflective, and adaptive dimensions of professional practice. A qualitative approach with semi-structured, in-depth interviews and thematic analysis is proposed to explore teachers’ understandings and experiences. The conceptual analysis and reviewed literature suggest that ethical self-cultivation may strengthen teacher leadership through ethical modelling, compassion, mentoring, collaboration, and responsible influence, while supporting CPD through self-regulation, reflective practice, resilience, practical wisdom, and intrinsic motivation. The study further conceptualises the relationship among ethical self-cultivation, teacher leadership, and CPD as dynamic and mutually reinforcing rather than strictly linear. The study contributes a human-centred, non-doctrinal perspective for reconceptualising teacher professionalism as an ongoing process of ethical, relational, and professional cultivation.
🏷️ Keywords
📚 How to Cite:
Dr. Barun Mishra , CULTIVATING ETHICAL TEACHER LEADERSHIP THROUGH BUDDHIST PHILOSOPHY FOR CONTINUOUS PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT , Volume 11 , Issue 9, September 2026, EPRA International Journal of Research & Development (IJRD) , Pages: 161 - 166 ,