Recent curriculum policy, both in Europe and elsewhere, emphasizes the importance of teacher involvement in curriculum development (Priestley & Biesta, 2013), and research has showed that teachers are increasingly defined as key actors in education reform and are expected to participate in curriculum work to act as agents of change (Mølstad & Prøitz, 2018; Priestley et al., 2012). Traditionally, subject experts from higher education as well as government administrators have been the most important actors in curriculum development processes, as they are highly knowledgeable of the field and can often pull great political legitimacy (Levin, 2008), so this new development can be considered a shift in views where teacher agency and involvement have become more important (Priestley et al., 2016). Further, it is emphasized in reform implementation studies that teachers need ownership of a reform in order to implement the new curriculum into their practices (Aasen & Sandberg, 2010). Consequently, a logic advocating the importance of teacher involvement in curriculum development processes has spread (Kirk & MacDonald, 2001; Westbury, 2008). This shift underscores the importance of research into how these processes work and the influence and role teachers have in curriculum development.

This study focuses on a central part of curriculum development, namely government-appointed curriculum committees mandated to make recommendations for national curricula, which is a common way of organizing curriculum development in Europe. Research has shown that these committees have much influence on the final official curriculum (Westbury et al., 2016). As an example for study, this paper zooms in on a recent curriculum development process in Norway. In 2020, Norway introduced a new national curriculum, called the Knowledge Promotion Reform 2020 (LK20), where co-creation and partnerships with the education sector were important policy elements of the development process. Teachers, in particular, were encouraged to take part in the development to a larger extent than in previous reforms (Report to Parliament 28 (2015-2016)). The study aims to investigate teachers’ role in curriculum committees and their contribution to the development process and the final curriculum. The research question is What is teachers’ role in curriculum committees and how do they contribute to curriculum development through this involvement?

Theoretically the study is guided by the concepts compartmentalization, segmentation and licensing (Hopmann, 1991). Compartmentalization refers to the process of dividing large-scale curriculum processes into smaller, more manageable parts so that no one will be held accountable for the whole. Segmentation involves separating different discourse communities (e.g. political, public and professional) into smaller groups who share a common frame of reference when solving complex curriculum development tasks. This enables different stakeholders to give input but also keeping potential for conflict low. Licensing involves delegating parts of the decision making to teachers and school leaders (Mikser et al., 2016). This manner of organizing curriculum development enables central authorities to have control of the process, while at the same time satisfying stakeholders.

The study draws on qualitative data material and analysis. The main data are semi-structured interviews (Kvale & Brinkmann, 2015). A selection of key policy documents and strategy documents were used as background material to better understand the curriculum development process and in developing the interview guide. Interviews were conducted with four informants, who held important roles in the development of the LK20 curriculum. Three of the informants are teachers who participated in a government-appointed curriculum committee that created recommendations for the LK20 curriculum. One interview was done with a representative for the Directorate for Education and Training who participated in and oversaw the process of creating the curriculum. Two pilot interviews were conducted before the research interviews, and small changes were done to the interview guides. All interviews were done digitally via the platform Zoom and lasted for about 45 minutes each. The interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim and the transcriptions were coded inductively using reflexive thematic analysis (Braun & Clark, 2006). Larger themes emerged and formed the foundation for further analysis and discussion.

Analysis is not finalized, but some expected findings can be outlined. Regarding the teachers’ contribution to the process and the curriculum, it is likely that teachers can bring forth content and methods that are appropriate for students at the different levels of the school system, as well as being possible for other teachers to operationalize in their classrooms. When it comes to the role of teachers in curriculum development, it seems like the teachers had an advisory role as members of the curriculum committee, but they were not part of any final decision-making processes. It seems that changes that were done after the curriculum committee submitted their final proposal to the Directorate for Education and Training were done by administrators in the Directorate as well as subject experts from higher education, and teachers were not part of this process. The study contributes to the field of curriculum research by informing on the role of an important stakeholder group in curriculum development processes, and can have implications for the involvement of teachers in future school reforms.

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