The organisation’s Leadership Development Program recruits "university-educated high achievers" to the classroom as teachers, placing them in eligible partner schools serving low socioeconomic communities for two years.

[3] To this end, teach For Australia placed 18 STEM specialists as part of the 2011 Cohort, who might otherwise have gone into the private sector.

In 2019 the organisation partnered with Australian Catholic University, allowing associates to earn a Master of Teaching (Secondary – Professional Practice) as part of the program.

In 2015 Teach For Australia alumnus Michael Briggs-Miller became the first program participant to become a principal when he took on the principalship of Warracknabeal Secondary College in Victoria’s Wimmera district.

Also in 2015, the Mitchell Institute published an index of opportunity that tracked educational disadvantage and showed that students from low socioeconomic households were significantly more likely to be behind their advantaged peers.

In Western Australia the secretary of the State School Teachers Union, Pat Byrne, said that, despite some good points, the model was flawed.

Despite the Government’s recommitment, opposition to the program grew following the screening of a three-part documentary on Australian free-to-air network SBS entitled "Testing Teachers in 2017".

The Future Leaders Program was specifically designed for teachers working in regional and remote schools facing educational disadvantage.

In the 2020 New South Wales State budget, Treasurer Dominic Perrottet and Education Minister Sarah Mitchell announced that the NSW Government would provide $400,000 in funding to Teach For Australia to design a new pathway program to encourage mid-career workers to move into teaching.

Across the network, associates, fellows and alumni work together with their communities and colleagues to become leaders for change in classrooms, schools, neighbourhoods, education systems and countries.