This study explores how secondary school teachers exercise agency when implementing curriculum reform, drawing on case studies conducted in twelve secondary schools. Through classroom observation, lesson artefacts and interviews with subject panel heads and classroom teachers, the study examines the space teachers find, or create, to adapt reform requirements to their own students and settings. It considers the conditions, including school leadership support, timetabling and access to professional development, that appear to enable or constrain this agency. The study finds that teachers with clearer channels for feeding classroom experience back into school-level planning report a stronger sense of ownership over reform, whereas teachers working in relative isolation tend to describe reform as something done to them rather than with them. The study proposes a small number of practical, low-cost adjustments that schools might consider when introducing further curriculum change, and situates these within the Faculty's broader interest in the relationship between policy intention and classroom practice.
Publication details
- Authors: Professor Lam Sze Wing and Dr Ng Wai Kuen, Department of Psychology
- Department: Department of Psychology
- Publication type: Faculty research report
- Published: September 2026
- Publisher: Faculty of Education and Human Development, The Education University of Hong Kong
- Series: FEHD Research Report Series, No. 13
- Language: English, with a Chinese summary
- Full text: Available on request from the Faculty Research Office — research@eduhk.hk
How to cite
Lam, S. W., & Ng, W. K. (2026). Teacher Agency Under Curriculum Reform: Evidence from Twelve Secondary Schools (FEHD Research Report Series No. 13). Faculty of Education and Human Development, The Education University of Hong Kong.