Hidden Curriculum for Student Leadership Development in Modern Islamic Boarding Schools: A Systematic Literature Review

Student leadership development in modern Islamic boarding schools (pesantren) takes more than formal instruction; it is substantially shaped by the hidden curriculum embedded in institutional culture and everyday educational practices. Previous studies have examined various elements of the hidden curriculum, but they generally discuss these components separately, thereby lacking an integrated perspective on how they collectively contribute to student leadership development. Departing from this gap, this study synthesizes recent literature on the role of the hidden curriculum and develops an integrated conceptual framework for leadership development within the pesantren-based educational ecosystem. A Systematic Literature Review (SLR) conducted in this study involves analyzing peer-reviewed journal articles published between 2021 and 2026 in Scopus-indexed or level 1-3 SINTA journals. The findings indicate that the hidden curriculum is constructed by five interconnected dimensions: institutional culture, role modeling, experiential learning, student organizations, and the integration of formal and non-formal education. The proposed framework demonstrates that these dimensions interact systematically to cultivate cognitive, affective, behavioral, spiritual, and leadership competencies through continuous educational experiences. This study offers a novel contribution by integrating fragmented findings from previous studies into a holistic conceptual framework that explains the systemic process of student leadership development in contemporary Islamic boarding schools and provides a theoretical foundation for future research and educational practice.