The weekly “Marshall Memo” curates research articles from many journals that Kim Marshall believes teachers, administrators, and parents will find useful.

I have known Kim for decades when he was a teacher in the Boston public schools, served as a district principal for 15 years and then worked in the central office with various superintendents.

I trust his judgment on what he thinks are important articles for teachers and administrators to read and ponder. Moreover, he is a graceful writer.

In this issue of the “Marshall Memo,” he has taken a scholarly article from the Review of Educational Research about teachers resisting mandated curriculum and materials. He summarizes the piece crisply, making it accessible to a wider audience than would usually read this academic journal.

That some teachers push back against a required curriculum is not news to veterans of the classroom. Why they do and how they adapt mandated lessons, however, offers important insights into classroom lessons particularly teacher flexibility and resilience.

In this Review of Educational Research article, Andrew Huddleston (Abilene Christian University) and four colleagues report on their study of the ways that some teachers engage in “principled resistance” to implementing mandated materials. An example: a teacher believed the highly scripted Open Court curriculum didn’t meet her students’ cultural and individual needs and implemented a creative literature-based curriculum with extensive student writing. Despite her kids scoring well on state tests, the teacher’s contract was not renewed because she wasn’t a team player; she left the profession.

“Although we greatly empathize with the teachers in this review who engaged in acts of principled resistance,” say Huddleston et al., “we are not advocates for an anarchical approach in which teachers do whatever they want for any reason. We recognize that even within a student-centered classroom, direct instruction still has a place, and a provided curriculum can be helpful, especially for new teachers.” Indeed, research has shown that a “guaranteed and viable curriculum” correlates with student achievement, and aligning curriculum across classrooms and grades can be part of an effective strategy for equitable student learning. On the other hand, test prep and rigid curriculum mandates can actually make test scores go down.

With those caveats, the researchers explore the literature on principled resistance and identify three reasons some teachers resist curriculum mandates, with an example for each:

• Social justice – Three bilingual teachers felt that monolingual instruction wasn’t meeting the needs of their emerging bilingual students and advocated with their colleagues on the importance of a 50/50 biliteracy approach. In another instance, high-school social studies teachers advocated for a justice-oriented ethnic studies curriculum focused on the surrounding community. 

• Students’ needs not being met – A teacher implementing the Lucy Calkins Units of Study curriculum believed the writing prompts were contrived and artificial, and she found ways to spark students’ writing ideas through conversations with each other. 

• Culturally responsive pedagogy – Two urban fifth-grade teachers objected to the test prep toolkit they were required to use and implemented a culturally responsive interdisciplinary unit that made connections to students’ lived experience. 

From their review of numerous studies, Huddleston and his co-authors describe these “models of resistance” used by teachers who have issues with curriculum materials:

–   Strategic compliance – they go along while believing their students aren’t served well.

–   Compliance with frustration – teachers are deeply unhappy but feel powerless to resist.

–   Compliance with complaint – they voice their concerns but aren’t listened to.

–   Resisting covertly – behind closed doors, teachers supplement or alter the material.

–   Strategic compromise – they use parts of the required curriculum but not others.

–   Adjusting pacing – teachers make changes in how time is allotted.

–   Rearranging – they change the sequence and substance to align with their beliefs. 

–   Supplementing – teachers add materials and techniques they believe are necessary.

–   Omitting – they skip certain elements and substitute their own ideas.

–   Hybridizing – teachers blend their own ideas with the required curriculum.

–   Persuading – they make the case for different materials to colleagues and leaders.

–   Going public – teachers use social media to try to influence parents and policymakers.

–   Collective action – they rally others to opt out of curriculum or testing.

–   Overt and outright rejection – teachers refuse to implement test prep or materials.

–   Forced to leave – as in the case above, a contract is not renewed or the teacher is fired.

–   Transferring – teachers move to a school with a more-sympatico curriculum. 

–   Leaving teaching – they decide the struggle is not worth it and change profession.

Did these forms of teacher pushback – from grudging compliance to putting their jobs on the line – result in better student outcomes? Unfortunately, say Huddleston et al., “none of the studies we located compared the student performance of teachers who resisted curricular mandates with those who did not.” It’s possible, they say, that some of the changes teachers made did more harm than good. Clearly more research is needed because in some cases, the opposite occurs: teachers persuade school leaders to make changes that improve student achievement. 

In the meantime, what are the implications of this study for school leaders? One guiding principle, say Huddleston et al., is watching for situations where teachers make the case for adaptations that are within the spirit and intent of a curriculum. “Being faithful to the purpose of a program,” they say, “addresses the need for a schoolwide focus and cohesion while at the same time carving out space for teacher discretion, decision-making, and necessary modification.” 

The big questions raised by this study: what’s best for students, how that’s measured, and who gets to decide. “Principled resistance,” say Huddleston et al., “is not laziness, stubbornness, or resistance to change,” but teachers who believe a mandated curriculum is harmful won’t help their students by suffering in silence or quitting. They’re most likely to improve things for students when they join with colleagues and make the case for curriculum changes that improve not only test scores but also students’ deeper learning and future well-being. 

The article closes with a quote from Margaret Mead: “Never doubt that a small group of concerned citizens can make a difference. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

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“Teachers’ Principled Resistance to Curricular Control: A Theoretical Literature Review” by Andrew Huddleston, Stephanie Talley, Sara Edgington, Emily Colwell, and Allison Dale in Review of Educational Research, December 2025 (Vol. 95, #6, pp. 1213-1250); Huddleston can be reached at andrew.huddleston@acu.edu.