From Access to Agency: Empowering Every Learner for the Future
(Seeds of Knowledge: Future-Ready Inclusive Schools Series — Article 5)
For many years, the language of “access” has shaped the conversation around inclusion. And rightly so, it matters deeply that all learners can access the curriculum, the school environment, and the wider opportunities that education provides. But in truly future-ready inclusive schools, access is only the starting point. The deeper goal is agency.
Access asks:
Can learners get through the door?
Can they participate in what is offered?
Agency asks:
Can learners shape their own learning?
Can they influence the life of the school?
Can they see themselves as active agents in their own future, and in the world beyond school?
This shift, from access to agency, is vital if we are serious about preparing young people for a complex, rapidly changing world. In a world of automation, AI, and constant innovation, students will need more than content knowledge. They will need adaptability, self-direction, creativity, and the confidence to make decisions in uncertain contexts. These are all qualities of agency, and they must be nurtured in school.
But here is the challenge, many school structures still centre compliance, not agency. Learners are too often positioned as passive recipients, expected to follow instructions, meet preset outcomes, and fit into fixed pathways. Inclusion in such a model may provide access, but it risks leaving students disempowered.
Future-ready inclusive schools, by contrast, recognise that genuine inclusion means creating conditions where all learners, not just a privileged few, can develop voice, choice, and ownership of their learning.
This means:
Designing learning experiences where students have real opportunities to make choices, about topics, processes, and outcomes.
Building assessment practices that honour student voice and allow for multiple ways of demonstrating understanding.
Creating school cultures where students are partners in shaping policies, programmes, and school life.
Supporting self-advocacy skills, particularly for learners who have been marginalised or historically excluded from decision-making.
Valuing learners as contributors, not just consumers, of knowledge, culture, and community.
Importantly, a focus on agency does not mean abandoning support or structure. It means designing scaffolded opportunities for students to build the skills of self-directed learning, with the right guidance, at the right time.
It means recognising that learners bring different strengths, experiences, and needs to this journey, which is why an inclusive approach to agency is essential. Agency is not about expecting every student to fit the same mould of “independence.” It is about helping each learner grow in ownership and voice, in ways that respect their identity and context.
When schools make this shift, from access to agency, powerful things happen.
Students who once saw school as something done to them begin to see it as something they can help shape. Learners who may have felt marginalised gain confidence that their perspectives matter. All students develop the skills and dispositions they will need to navigate, and lead, in a dynamic future.
Inclusion is not complete if it stops at access. The goal must be empowerment, because the future belongs to those who can think critically, collaborate thoughtfully, adapt courageously, and act with agency.
