When Students Have Agency, Learning Flourishes. Here's Why (Opinion)

Today’s post is the second in a series

exploring how teachers can create the conditions for student agency to flourish.

‘Agency Doesn’t Replace Structure, It Transforms It’

Meg Riordan, Ph.D., is the chief learning officer of The Possible Zone, an organization serving high school students through career-connected, STEAM-based programs that equip them with the durable and technical skills to access pathways to economic mobility:

In classrooms where student agency flourishes, something powerful shifts. Students stop asking, “Is this the right answer?” and start asking, “What do I want to explore?” They move from disengaged receivers of knowledge to active designers of it.

But agency

, which includes voice, choice, and ownership over learning, isn’t the byproduct of encouragement alone. It’s deep relationships

and a shared sense of purpose. Simply, agency doesn’t emerge by chance; it must be cultivated.

I’ve seen agency across classrooms and innovative learning spaces nationwide, especially in spaces that promote deeper learning

, which combines key skills and mindsets needed for students to succeed in 21st-century careers and beyond. In deeper learning environments, experiences are designed to build confidence, self-efficacy, and authentic impact. Deeper learning doesn’t just ask students to reproduce knowledge; it challenges them to create and apply knowledge to real-world problems, think critically, collaborate, and reflect. In this context, agency isn’t just a part of learning—it’s the purpose of it.

In the New Tech Network

—a national nonprofit dedicated to systemic change in education—students engage in project-based learning experiences that include problem-solving, complex thinking, and authentic impact. Student agency is at the heart of learning.

For example, at one New Tech high school in Ohio, students cultivated a community garden that connects academic content with real-world impact, from growing produce to launching a student-run coffee agribusiness. Through hands-on experiences in agriscience, culinary arts, and environmental advocacy, students make meaningful decisions, apply their knowledge in authentic contexts, and take ownership of their learning journeys. This approach empowers them to lead, innovate, and engage with their communities while preparing for college, careers, and civic life.

Similarly, the CAPS Network

(Center for Advanced Professional Studies) offers another model of agency in action. CAPS connects high school students to industry-aligned projects and professional mentors. In these learning spaces, students aren’t just preparing for the real world, they’re immersed in it. They tackle authentic problems, manage complex projects, and reflect in iterative learning cycles.

Educators serve as guides and coaches, helping young people navigate ambiguity, build project-management skills, and advocate for themselves—skills that define agency. Educators provide structured autonomy that includes learning plans, feedback tools, and regular reflection to ensure that students are making progress toward goals.

At The Possible Zone

, an organization centered on promoting economic mobility by developing 21st-century skills for in-demand careers, we ask: “What conditions are we creating for student agency to emerge?” because agency thrives when key elements are in place:

• Trust and Belonging: Students must feel safe to take risks, share ideas, and fail forward. When educators prioritize relationships, intentionally co-design culture and norms, and hold high expectations, students learn to trust themselves and each other.
  
• Relevance and Purpose: When learning connects to students’ lives, cultures, and aspirations, investment deepens. Purpose fuels ownership. Understanding each student’s interests and passions positions educators to support personalized learning.
  
• Reflection and Feedback: Agency doesn’t mean “go it alone.” Students receive coaching, reflect, and revise their thinking; they learn to value input from others, self-assess, and use tools like AI to augment their own ideas.
  
• Scaffolded Autonomy: Agency doesn’t replace structure, it transforms it. Students learn the skills of self-direction and self-efficacy: They set goals, manage time, collaborate, and make choices that prepare them for careers of the future.

As we face a future shaped by emerging technology, we must help to amplify agency as a critical skill for all and especially those students marginalized by systems

of compliance and control. In spaces like those in the New Tech Network, CAPS, and TPZ, we see what happens when young people are trusted with meaningful work: They lead. They shape their futures. And they become architects of change for their communities and the world around them.

‘A Formidable Undertaking’

Alan C. Jones has spent the past five decades working in and writing about the American education system:

Before educators look for ways to create the conditions for student agency, they must first come to terms with the reality that the schools they work in and the classrooms they teach in are designed to achieve institutional goals—standardization, compliance, and accountability.

The design of school classrooms, the role teachers are expected to perform, and the organization of subject matter pay little or no attention to the educational goals listed in school mission statements—all of which proclaim that their educational programs foster conditions that promote student agency.

Coming to terms with these institutional realities, teachers must have the courage, and the pedagogical and bureaucratic savvy, to “go off the books.” The challenge in going off the books is a formidable undertaking.

Teachers must adhere to the institutional curricula (subjects, textbooks, pacing guides, and grading systems) while also designing activity structures that engage students in methods of inquiry that foster the values in their school’s mission statement: critical thinking, collaborative teams, collective inquiry, and lifelong learning.

Teachers committed to restoring student agency in their classrooms must be ready to step out of their role as the primary source of knowledge and into the role of facilitator—helping students to discover, apply, and reflect on learning for themselves.

What does a facilitator look like in a classroom? Instead of lecturing from the front of the room, they design projects, discussions, and simulations that transform their role from knowledge giver to facilitator of collaborative learning. In that role, they shift responsibility for learning to students: assisting them with setting goals, monitoring progress, and providing feedback on the problems they have chosen to solve.

The challenge for teachers, whose focus is on student engagement, is overcoming their schools’ institutional expectations and their communities’ expectations that teachers behave like the teachers that taught in their classrooms.

Thanks to Meg and Alan and for contributing their thoughts.

Responses today answered this question:

How have you created the conditions for student agency to develop in your classroom?

Consider contributing a question to be answered in a future post. You can send one to me at lferlazzo@epe.org

. When you send it in, let me know if I can use your real name if it’s selected or if you’d prefer remaining anonymous and have a pseudonym in mind.

You can also contact me on X at @Larryferlazzo

or on Bluesky at @larryferlazzo.bsky.social

Just a reminder; you can subscribe and receive updates from this blog via email

. And if you missed any of the highlights from the first 13 years of this blog, you can see a categorized list here

.