The concept of development is a value-loaded term. In whatever context it is used--child development or economic development, for example--the term "development" implies something more than simply change. It implies moving toward an approved goal, toward something that is valued. So to understand educational development there is a need to explore what is valued by developers as individuals and as an emerging community of practice. But educational development is a diverse field and this diversity is reflected in the range of value commitments held by individual developers. It is precisely because the goals of educational development are to some degree contested that "notions of development are of necessity a site for encounter and dispute." This article looks at what is understood by "values" and then at the values that motivate individuals to become (and remain) educational developers. It also considers the values adopted in some national educational development networks as a way of interrogating the collective values of this diverse community of practice. Finally this article looks at some of the difficulties that arise when these values come into conflict with the increasingly dominant managerial culture of universities today.