This is part III in History of Public Education.
In 1916 John Dewey became famed for authoring Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education. Dewey was a key player in promoting “the progressive political movement,” or “Progressive Education,” which attempts to make schools conduits for a democratic society.
Superintendent William A. Wirt of Gary, Indiana, public schools was also a member of the “Progressive Education” fan-club. Inspired by Dewey and his own Protestant background Wirt believed schools should provide “salvation for its children and community.”
It was thought that home economics was the missing link in American education and much attention given to it. The philosophy went that the labor riots and strikes were due to that families could not balance their household budgets and wives not cook a hot meal, driving the husband’s to drinking in the saloons. Public School, which was now seen as the cure of all society’s ills, was going to step in and save the day.
Gary was a town literally founded and built by U.S Steel Corporation. It was a booming town during the industrial era, with a heterogeneous population.
Wirt ran the school district deliberately and systematically. It was a system designed to yield workers for the booming industrial era and the system conditioning the young trainees was a prime example in its design.
There were two educational plans in Gary, the Work-Study-Play, or the Platoon School Plan. Wirt used the classrooms 24/7 year round—children learning in the day—adults at night. The curriculum included manual training like woodshop for boys and cooking for girls, and other non-academic subjects that had not been typical in classrooms until this point. Less focus was put on reading, writing and mathematics. After all, only a few could be business owners and organizational leaders. The vast majority would need skills that operated machinery or worked the conveyor belt…or cook meals for their husbands. The students were organized into two platoons who switched schedules for maximum facility efficiency.
Many schools prior to World War I taught foreign languages. Since immigrants were pouring in finding teachers in these native tongues was not an overly difficult task. Immigrant groups tended to stick together and valued perseverance of their language and traditions. One of the most popular foreign languages was German. Hundreds of thousands of kids learned both the German language as well as “about the glories of Germany.” Makes sense since it wasn’t just the German immigrants who thought that German traditions were just swell, but remember, the education leaders had modeled the entire system off the Prussian militant school model.
However, this PDA toward German anything was quickly changed with the Great War.
United States Present Theodor Roosevelt was a believer in English-only curriculum and wrote already in 1907, “We have room for but one language in this country and that is the English language, for we intend to see that the crucible turns our people out as Americans, of American nationality, and not as dwellers in a polyglot boarding house.”
The popularization of this idea was quickly fanned by the brewing international climate and a growing anti-German sentiment. The Great War necessitated renaming to World War I upon the start of World War II. Many immigrants changed their names and refused to teach their children their native language, especially if it was German, to avoid implied affiliation with the Nazis.
“Official English” advocate groups were quick to support with the belief that “the passage of English as the official language will help to expand opportunities for immigrants to learn and speak English, the single greatest empowering tool that immigrants must have to succeed.”
It is interesting that it was the English and Irish influence which was the flavor of national fear just a century before.
Yet equality and fair equal access to education was still much under dispute.
By the 1950’s the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was ready to take its case all the way. It was still commonly believed (and lawful) that education segregation was constitutional as long as separate facilities were equal. This was certainly not the case. NCAAP organized a group of black parents to attempt to enroll their children in white schools nearby. Among them, Reverend Oliver Brown and his 8-year old daughter Linda.
The case, Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, went all the way to the Supreme Court.
On May 17, 1954, a unanimous decision of the court was announced: “It is doubtful that any child may reasonably be expected to succeed in life if he is denied the opportunity of an education. Such an opportunity…is a right which must be available to all on equal terms. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.”– Chief Justice Earl Warren
This seems an opportune time in history to ask you, the reader a few Socratic questions: Do you think children are being denied the opportunity of an education “on equal terms” today? Does America have room for more “but one language?” Has public education saved our society from poverty and crime (as per Horace Mann’s prediction), or stopped husbands from going to the bars and become better fathers (as per Wirt)? Do we fear the international influences of other cultures today? Why? How do you predict that such fears (if any) will impact education for future generations?
Follow our conversation and conclusion of History of Public Education by checking www.summercounts.com frequently, or by subscribing below.
http://education.stateuniversity.com/pages/2002/Gary-Schools.html
http://www.cloudnet.com/~edrbsass/educationhistorytimeline.html
http://www.pbs.org/kcet/publicschool/roots_in_history/choice.html
http://www.aoh61.com/history/bible/nativism_chronology.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English-only_movement
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