Estonia is an interesting case for studying student agency due to its ethnically segregated school system. Since the Soviet occupation in 1940 the Estonian education system was segregated into Estonian and Russian language schools to accommodate an increasing number of Russian speaking immigrants. After Estonia regained its independence in 1991 the only official language became Estonian but 25% of the population speaks Russian. The segregation has created many problems: Russian schools lag behind in state exam and PISA test results (on average by 40 points). Further, the Estonian language skills of many Russophone students are not sufficient to continue their education in high school or higher education where the instructional language is predominantly Estonian. There is some evidence that teachers in Russian schools have not adopted the same student-centred educational philosophy as in Estonian schools (Carnoy, Khavenson & Ivanova 2015) and prefer using the Soviet pedagogy. As a consequence, Russian students face problems with social mobility (Kunitsõn & Kalev 2021). This study had two aims: to develop an instrument to measure student's agency for Estonian and Russian schools and to compare the agency scores of students in order to ascertain to what extent do Estonian and Russian language schools currently support the development of students into agentic, critically thinking and creative individuals and citizens for a democratic society. The student agency scale includes concepts such as: agentic engagement (Reeve & Shin, 2020), resistance to perceived injustice (Mameli, Grazia & Molinari, 2021), perceived agency support (Reeve & Shin, 2020), persistence in pursuits (Vaughn, 2021; Dweck, 2006). According to a confirmatory factor analysis they loaded in three factors. 9309 students in grades 6-12 from 55 Estonian and 4 Russian schools participated in the main study in February 2022. Four hypotheses were set: 1) Students in Estonian gymnasia report higher levels of agency than students in Russian schools; 2 there are differences in perceived agency support in Russian and Estonian language schools; 3) there are gender differences in the agency scores between boys and girls both in Estonian and Russian schools; 4) students in higher school stages report higher levels of agency both in Estonian and Russian schools. The indpendent T-tests and Anova tests proved all four hypotheses. Student's agency scores were higher in Estonian schools and boys estimated their capacity for agentic behaviour and teachers’ support for their agency higher than girls. This confirms that agency is a cultural and gender phenomenon.

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