Schools are influenced by political economy and ideology
of the time period. School reform is influenced by a few
powerful forces or by “crisis” of need.
EPS 210/202 Timeline--Development of Public Schooling Unit 1

1776-1830 Post-Revolution Jefferson
 No system of public schools
 Identified need to educate for a stable republic

1830-1890 Common School Model Horace Mann
 Common curriculum, six to eight years of basic education, character
training was crucial, seeking social stability.
 1890s a small # of high schools had an academic classical curriculum

1890-1950 Progressive Era-- 2 perspectives > students, K-12, > diversity
 1.Social Efficiency (Elliot and Cubberly) Dominant view, what is its
legacy? SORTING MACHINE MODEL
 2.Developmental Democracy (Dewey)
Experimental schools
 Dewey’s Planned School Reform
Horace Mann (1837-1848) SOCIAL REFORMER
By the 1830s, the time was ripe for public support of
elementary education in Massachusetts

Can schools help with these kinds
of social problems? How?
 Crime
 Corruption
 Drunkenness
 Delinquency
 Political violence
 Class violence
How? MORAL TRAINING
and DISCIPLINE
Purpose of School:
To improve society
HORACE MANN’S COMMON SCHOOL
4 MEANINGS OF COMMON
“EDUCATE ALL IN COMMON”
1. PUBLIC Free, tax-supported education
2. COMMON CURRICULUM Standardization of subject
matter and teaching methods. Teach a curriculum not
so different from schools in the 1820s and 1830s
Basic Skills -Reading, ‘Riting, ‘Rithmetic (3 Rs),
spelling, history, geography, music. 4th and 5TH R??
Religion and Republicanism
3. OPEN TO ALL Common experience for diverse
students (exception: segregated schools for free blacks
in Boston)
4. COMMON IDEOLOGY Teach ideology of the Republic
COMMON SCHOOLS
HORACE MANN
–TO SOLVE SOCIAL PROBLEMS
WHAT WAS TAUGHT AND HOW?

Basic Skills -Reading, writing, numbers,
spelling, history, geography, music.

Moral training--linked to religion but
tried to “secularize” moral training, but
local control allowed for sectarianism to
operate.

Elementary Level Six years for all
students, a longer school year.

State made attendance compulsory
MANN-- COMMON SCHOOL
GOAL: TO PROMOTE SOCIAL STABILITY
PROTESTANTISM

PROTESTANTISM

MORAL LESSONS

Mann devised a set of virtues called the
“COMMON ELEMENTS”
Opposition to Prayers, Bible, how the
common elements were taught. Not just
on secular grounds, some conservatives
wanted more religion.
Supported by moderate Protestants
OPPOSITION Alienates almost
everyone else:
 Conservative Protestants
 Nonbelievers, Jews, and Irish
Catholics who leave the public
school and establish parochial
schools (on the Irish, see
Urban,Wagoner, 115)
Horace Mann
Teaching moral values

Moral lessons taught
through Protestant
materials (prayers,
stories of virtue and vice,
and study of bible).

Mann was supported by
moderate Protestants.
Mann supports Bible readings and “appropriate" set of
moral values known as the common elements
(in Mann’s 12th Report)

What are the common elements? Piety, justice, sacred
regard for truth, love of country, humanity, universal
benevolence, sobriety, industry, frugality, chastity,
moderation, and temperance.
Mann believed
that human nature
can be formed.
Common School Advocates Like Mann Were
MORALISTS Moral training was as
important as teaching basic skills.
Mann was driven by a
compelling need for moral
consensus due to social
STRIFE:
 Religious struggles
 Economic strife between
rich and poor, labor
unrest
 Tensions between Irish
immigrants and locals
MANN--COMMON SCHOOL
TO PROMOTE SOCIAL STABILITY
REPUBLICANISM
REPUBLICANISM
 Some political roles for
some citizens
 All members of society
needed virtue
What kinds of books were used in the
schools of the new Republic?
Noah Webster’s American Spelling Book**
http://www.merrycoz.org/books/spelling/SP
ELLING.HTM
Webster American Spelling
Book Contained:
 Protestant Catechism
 Moral lessons in stories
 Politics
 Americanization of spelling
English words
Noah Webster’s Political Training
LIMITS of Liberalism
American Spelling Book
on Voting


Q. Can every an [sic “man”] in the states vote for
delegates to Congress?
A. By no mans [sic]. In almost every state some
property is necessary to give a man a right to vote.
In general, men who have no estate, pay no taxes,
and who have no settled habitation, are not
permitted to vote for rulers, because they have no
interest to secure, they may be vagabonds or
dishonest men, and may be bribed by the rich.
Noah Webster’s
American Spelling Book Politics
Representative Government is best.

Q. Is there another and better form of government
than any of these?

A. There is. A REPRESENTATIVE REPUBLIC[,]
in which the people freely choose deputies to make
laws for them, is much the best form of government
hitherto invented.
Raises questions about role of citizen
PROGRESSIVE ERA
Dramatic Changes in the Political Economy 20th Century
SOCIAL CONDITIONS 1900 (Tozer, Chapter 5)
Pressures of 1893 Depression, the rise of modern
industrial society, urbanization and immigration.
Social problems:
Immigration
Industrialization Low Wages
Labor Unrest (Strikes, Riots)
Poverty in Cities Child Labor
Discrimination
What does “progressive” mean?
It emerged out of 1893 Depression, spurred interest in all
kinds of social and economic reform. Handout


Progressive refers to “a movement to organize 20th century
American society into an efficiently functioning unit that would
be in HARMONY with the needs of a MODERN
INDUSTRIAL society.”
Progressive means moving towards a more ORDERLY,
MORAL, DEMOCRATIC society. (Depending upon how
these goals are defined--can create conflicts.)
“Efficiently functioning society…[needs to] operate on principles
of non-partisan politics, scientific and professional expertise.”
In 1900 the question was how to reform public schools to
accommodate the large, new student populations---new
immigrants, working class, and racial ethnic minorities.
TWO VERY DIFFERENT VIEWS OF
PROGRESSIVE EDUCATION
SCHOOL REFORM
Elliot
Based on the forces in the Political Economy and
Ideology what should be done to reform schools?
Dewey

2 Views emerged which differed on
 Ideology and Social Goals
What is one of the most important outcomes
of the social efficiency movement?
One of the most important outcomes of the Social
Efficiency Progressive Education Movement was the
differentiated curriculum-college, general, and
vocational courses.
Today, we differentiate the curriculum with tracks,
some career training, and some study/work
programs. Some schools provide only limited
academic training.
Today, the goal for the nation and for Illinois is to
prepare all students for post-secondary education.
Why study this period? **Developed the Modern School Model-Sorting Machine Model begins
Kindergarten--12th grade
More students attend
Rapid expansion of new schools
Added high school
Differentiated curriculum-college, general, vocational
14-17 year olds--high school aged students. Dramatic increase of
14-17 year olds who attend school between 1890 and 1940.

1890 7% attended high schools, and half of these students were
in private schools

1920 32% attended high school, most in public schools, but only
one third graduate.

1940 70% attended high school, but only half graduate

Today, almost universal attendance-- 75% graduate HS with a
diploma, many of those who dropout later get a GED.
What schooling should you expect
for your children?
If your family worked in a factory, what kind of
education could you expect in 1910?____________
This legacy continues until 1980s when scholars raise
questions about curriculum and tracking of students.
If your family works in a factory or another low
income job today, what kind of education should you
expect? My expectation would be….
In 1910 how did the differentiated curriculum
serve different students? Intended to fit children
equally well for their particular life’s work.
“Harmony with an industrial society.”
How could social efficiency progressives believe they were acting
in the name of democracy? (Tozer, 145) They were responding
to new social, economic and political conditions, changing
ideology, and the “failure” of traditional schools.
Today, we question any practice where the structure reproduces
class differences.
Key question for schools today is: What kind of core preparation
(political, social, economic) is needed for a successful life in
today’s world?
A second important outcome of the social
efficiency movement is the widespread use of
testing in the schools to place students in
different curricular tracks.
IQ Testing Movement Aided Social Efficiency
Tozer, Chapter 5, 148-159, 160
IQ Tests in World War I was biased against
various nationalities, and minority groups
Group Testing (paper and pencil tests) for those
with limited English, limited school experience,
living in poverty
Resulted in low IQ Test Scores for those with
limited English and limited schooling.
Low test scores were thought to mean limited
academic ability.
Administrative Progressive
Professor and Dean Ellwood Cubberly,
Stanford University, School of Education
1919 stated in his book:
“Largely illiterate, docile, often lacking in initiative, and
almost wholly without the Anglo-Saxon conceptions of
righteousness, liberty, law, order, public decency, and
government, their coming has served to dilute
tremendously our national stock and to weaken and
corrupt our political life.”
Who is Cubberly referring to?
The views by Social Efficiency Progressive
Educators dominated 20th century schooling.
This era began the Sorting Machine Model.

Schools should prepare students for their future life
 Class, gender, and race/ethnicity determined FUNCTION in society-curricular differentiation –college preparation, vocational, and general
curriculum.
 Schools had to run more efficiently
 Schools should be run by experts
 Rise of centralization and bureaucracy (large school districts, teachers at
the bottom of the hierarchy, less parental input on school boards, large
schools)
 Knowledge as static, could just be “learned”, training for skills
 Some groups not capable of learning academic subjects
 Testing assisted in proper placement
 Racial/ethic, gender, and class discrimination
IDEOLOGY SHIFT –The Modern Liberal State
Classical Liberalism evolved into Modern Liberalism
See Tozer 145-150









Reason-- became defined as Scientific Rationality--Greater influence by science
and the use of scientific rationality
Reason--New Psychology--Genetic Theories of Intelligence, scientific evidence
of capacity through IQ testing, concluded that many were limited in their
capacity to reason, targeted certain ethnic groups, behaviorism (learn by
stimulus-response, not reason), Freud’s notions of the subconscious and power of
emotions over personality and behaviors.
Individualism—person is a cell in a larger social organism
Virtue—good person replaced with good citizen
Progress--via expert planning and management, progress is not inevitable.
Natural Law--Darwin’s theory of evolution “universe not fixed” “social
Darwinist claimed not all races as fully evolved” “some not fit to survive”
Nationalism--Increased nationalism (2 World Wars)
Freedom--Laissez-faire government (negative freedom--freedom from
interference) replaced by government intervention (to preserve freedom you need
an active government and government regulations)
Power centered more with EXPERTS.
Philosopher John Dewey
One of the main leaders
Disagreed with Social Efficiency about:
Developmental Democracy Progressives disagreed with
social efficiency progressives’ views about school
reform.

Dewey did not support:



Differentiated curriculum (supported a unified
curriculum)
Vocational training in schools (manual training,
occupations of life, but not training for specific jobs)
Limited view of human capacity (tremendous potential if
proper education provided)