How to reference the current entry element in custom Control Panel templates?
As you discovered, you can get the current element that a field type is getting applied to via $this-&gt;element. However you must keep in mind that that property will not always be set. So make sure that your PHP/template code is defensive about the possibility that there is no known element yet.

Another assumption to avoid is that the current element is going to be an entry. Craft lets you associate fields with any type of element - entries, users, assets, categories, tags, globals, and Matrix blocks, and even any custom element types that plugins may add. So $this-&gt;element-&gt;section should be avoided unless you know that $this-&gt;element is actually an EntryModel; otherwise that will give you a PHP error.