EVIL public education! Boo! Hiss! Waste of money. Teachers with their cushy nine-month jobs riding the gravy train on our dime. How dare they!
Republican governor after Republican governor wants to destroy this monster within our midst. And, I can name one prominent cough Rahm cough Democratic mayor as well.
Who created this horrible institution? And why?
Let's travel back in time. The 1870s. United States.
I started this diary a couple of years ago while I was still working. Before my retirement I worked in the gov docs department of a Federal Depository Library. There are over a thousand FDLs in the United States and its territories. Depending on the library's location and length of time as an FDL, you may find original documents well over a century old. I really love old stuff. Old government documents in particular can be fascinating and eye opening. My favorites were the U.S. Serial Sets -- the Congressional Documents and Reports. Many are digitized and online but it can be quite a treasure hunt to find them in hard copy.
Anyone interested in public education should sit down with the Reports of the Commissioner of Education from the 1870s. These are online at the Hathi Trust Digital Library
It's impossible to do justice to the 1870 560-page report in a few paragraphs but here is my woefully inadequate attempt. I've pulled out some of the points that I found interesting or relevant to current debates within our society
The Commissioner of Education was the title given to the head of the National Bureau of Education, a former unit within the Department of the Interior in the United States. The position was created on March 2, 1867 when an Act to establish a department of education took effect.
The Commissioner was responsible for:
* Formulating educational policy
* Administering the various functions of the Office of Education
* Coordinating educational activities at the national level
wikipedia
The bulk of these reports are collections of statistics on the country's educational institutions. State and territory breakdowns of numbers of students, ages, numbers of teachers, their pay and qualifications, and school finances. Along with with what we now define as schools the reports examine institutions for the deaf, dumb, and blind, colored schools, education of Indians, reform schools and education in prisons, insane asylums and homes for the feebleminded, and institutions of higher education and teacher training. These are the terms used in the reports.
The stats are interesting but what's really eye opening is the introductory and explanatory material. Given the ongoing debates over all aspects of our current educational system, I'd like to share some excerpts from how it used to be. Different ways of doing things and, most strikingly, an entirely different ethos.
At the time of this report education was not yet compulsory and public school was not available to large swaths of the population. Freed slaves were now entitled to an education. The thousands of settlers who streamed into the West established community schools. And the displaced Native Americans needed to be "civilized."
We can read idealism and great ambition in this report and we can see the genesis of some of the policies detrimental to Native and African Americans.
The first Commissioner of Education was Henry Barnard. He spends several pages lamenting the paucity of his resources and detailing the enormity of establishing his bureau and compiling this first report which examined not only the American education system but compared it with that in other nations. But, above all, the report shows how our country's educators worked to make Thomas Jefferson's words a universal reality. "An educated citizenry is a vital requisite for our survival as a free people."
The idea of national attention to education, as well as to agriculture, had been urged in vain by Washington and his compeers, and repeated from time to time by many of our most patriotic statesmen …. p. 5
Barnard explains his holistic rationale for information included in the report.
My object has been to exclude no fact which conveyed an educational lesson or suggestion to the American people. … Why should it be limited to what is done in the school-room or to the curriculum of the college, or of the professional and industrial schools? Why should not every parent feel that the education of man here begins with the cradle, and every citizen carry about with him the conviction that it ends only with the grave, and shape American education so as to comprehend those limits in life, and enable it to reach the highest possible attainments? In this ideal every educational force, whether affecting body or mind, in childhood or age, of the individual or communities, would have its appropriate place. p. 9
He states his philosophy on the importance of the data contained in the reports thusly:
Educators have not merely to educate each generation in childhood, but to educate each generation of adults into the sentiments upon which the intelligent and wise conduct of school and home instruction must depend. What is accomplished for those enrolled needs to be constantly compared with what should be done for the entire population of school age. The attention and sympathy of all interested should be turned to the entire work which the school system ought to do. pp. 12-13
As Barnard previews the information presented in the individual state and territory abstracts, we can see precursors to the establishment of separate but equal and the debates of today regarding charter versus public education. The recent end of the Civil War also brought a whole new aspect to education in the U.S. particularly in the South.
The satisfactory results of the abolition of the rate-bill, and of making the schools entirely free, are presented in the New York, Connecticut, Michigan, and New Jersey reports. The experience of these, and of other States that have long since taken similar action, should be a sufficient warning to those in the South, where new free schools are going into operation, against the adoption of measures so fraught with evil. p. 13
He goes on to detail the progress, or lack of progress, in establishing a free public school system in the states of the former Confederacy.
Likewise, Barnard describes challenges to establishing an educational system in the territories and former Indian lands and includes letters and quotes from educators and territorial officials.
The educational system was to extend equal opportunities to Native Americans. Barnard pleads for more commitment to that goal. Granted, the text reflects the paternalistic racial ethos of the time but education was considered a universal right. Within the paternalism though is anticipation of the future.
Since the educational endeavors of John Eliot among the Indians, the sentiment among Anglo-Americans has struggled over Indian education vs. Indian destruction. On the one hand all humane and Christian considerations have been affirmed to demand every exertion for their education, and challenged opposition by pointing to examples of success. pp. 22-23
snip
Educators have a special responsibility in this work, from which they cannot shrink. p. 24
The Indian tribes and bands resident within the United States are directly under the control of the General Government. Its authority over these scattered communities, within the limits which the policy so long followed in relation to them has assigned, is complete. The General Government is the protector and guardian of this race. They are regarded as its "wards."
snip
How soon the Indian shall become a citizen is a question for others to consider. But the conclusion is inevitable. Either citizenship or extinction seems to be the Indian's destiny.
What, then, is our duty? Clearly to prepare them for an intelligent acceptance of the position. We should be incited to a systematic effort for the education of the Indians, not alone for the realization of the fact that experience has dearly taught us that it is cheaper by far to feed and teach than to fight and slay, but from the higher motive of fitly preparing them for the duties of citizenship. p. 339
The concept of Kindergarten originated in Germany and the report examines the benefits of kindergarten to get childhood education off to a good start. Incidentally, this section also makes trenchant commentary on our "teach to the test" system and our attitudes toward teachers.
In defining education as only the acquisition of knowledge, which is but an incident of it, we have indeed but followed the example set by the Old World, and have hoped that by offering this knowledge to all, instead of sequestering it to certain classes, we have done all that is possible. But it is not so. The quality of our education should rise above, or at least not sink below, that of the nations who have educated their few to dominate over the many, else our self-government will be disgraced; and, therefore, I would present the claims of the new system of primary education, which has been growing up in Germany during the present century ….
snip
In the report of Dr. Hoyt (United States commissioner to the Paris Exposition of 1867) on the present state of education in Europe, there is a short, clear, and very striking statement of the normal education given to the primary teachers of all the Germanic nations, Prussia taking the lead. He says they all recognize that the primary department of education is at once the most important and difficult, and requires in its teachers, first, the highest order of mind; secondly, the most general cultivation; and thirdly, the most careful cherishing, greatest honor, and the best pay, for it has the charge of children at the season of life when they are most entirely at the mercy of their educators. p. 355
Wow! Reread that last sentence.
The philosophy of kindergarten described in the report extends the nurturing and play between parents and young children which guides the children through their own learning process. This section is too long to block quote and impossible to synopsize more deeply. Read through pages 354-359 for the rationale and benefits of learning through play for young children.
The report includes a long section on the "Chinese Migration" relevant in many ways to our current immigration debate as well as "otherness" within our society.
Again, it's difficult to adequately synopsize. pp. 422-434. Among the concerns are:
The first thing that arrests the attention in this movement is its prospective magnitude. p. 422
Character of the Chinese immigrants was deemed "more sober, more industrious, more orderly and faithful than the same class from European countries" and are universally literate in their own language.
Though the country was in need of laborers there was concern that the immigrants would suppress wages.
The fear of paganism was swept aside; Mormonism was considered the greater threat, "Who ever heard of an American convert to Chinese Buddhism? … But it is proved that the Chinaman easily drops off his superstitions and idolatries."
Education would complete the immigrant assimilation in regards to American language, dress and habits, homes, and manners paving the way to citizenship.
The report concludes with a section on education and labor.
In the United States there is some danger of mistaking the elements of education for education itself, through leaving to private effort, rather than the community, the providing of means for such comprehensive and thorough instruction in the practical arts and sciences, which is demanded more and more by the industrial necessities and progress of the age. p. 439
Included is a survey of arts and technical education in other countries and an employer/laborer questionnaire. Respondents to this set of questions included employers of skilled, semi-skilled, and unskilled manual laborers. Another set of similar questions was put to laborers and yet another to observers. The entire questionnaire makes for an interesting read. (pp.447-467) Respondents valued education beyond mere literacy though, of course, that was the base. They valued mathematical ability such as algebra and geometry. Geology was considered important. Arts, technical drawing, mechanical aptitude were all considered important skills. Employers and laborers stressed the importance of not just knowing what to do on the job but knowing why and understanding the process beyond the tasks.
Question 2. Have you observed a difference in skill, aptitude, or amount of work executed by persons you have employed, arising from a difference in their education, and independent of their natural abilities?
Answers. (a) Yes. Though it is a rare occurrence that there is a person in this community who is totally destitute of some education. The best educated, as a general rule, excel. (b) I have. (c) This I believe to be a well-settled fact. (d) Yes. (e) We have observed a vast difference. (f) Such persons have more skill and fidelity, because of their general information and consequent freedom from prejudice, incident to ignorant persons. An educated intelligent artisan is worth 50 per cent more than an ignorant one. (g) Unquestionably. (h) Yes. (i) Yes. (j) Very marked. (k) Yes. (l) This question, like some of those that follow, is so simple and the reply so obvious, that it is a matter of some surprise that it should be a matter of question at all. We answer yes. (m) The difference is most marked. Those having some education invariably advance to leading positions, while the opposite seldom rise above laborers. (n) We are at serious loss by the ignorance of laborers, and find great odds in favor of Germans and other "educated" labor. (o) Yes. I have observed that the negro who was making an attempt to educated himself, and who was partially educated, was mostly preferable to an uneducated negro. (p) Yes. (q) We think those who are educated excel. (r) Cannot answer these questions definitively, my observations have not been extensive enough. (s) Education is and always has been a very important recommendation for all classes of labor. p. 448
I'll pull out just a couple more responses.
I have always noticed that an educated man can do more work, and do it better when taste has to be displayed, than an uneducated man, in the same amount of time; and the reason is, in my opinion, an educated man takes advantage of a great many circumstances which are not presented to the mind of an uneducated worker; yet I believe a man can be reared up to any business, and become proficient without an education, though I believe it would increase his powers to have one. p. 452
A good, practical knowledge of the arts and sciences that underlie the various trades and occupations would furnish instruments to the workingman to increase doubly the productiveness and quality of the material, add 50 per cent annually to the nation's wealth, and increase his wages 25 per cent. p. 464
As it is with any document from so long ago we can't fully empathize with the writer or totally comprehend the subject matter. But we can see the precursors to our thoughts and we can see instances where we can be thankful some of those thoughts were abandoned. All in all, it's an interesting trip into the past.
Sat Feb 28, 2015 at 7:38 AM PT: Thank you for the rescue. Primary education used to be considered important beyond learning to read and do basic arithmetic. So many schools have cut the very subjects that inspire kids to learn. Yes, art and music and science ARE important. These aren't topics to pick up later. We're missing the window of opportunity and our society is poorer for that.
History buffs, find your nearest Federal Depository Library. The U.S. Serial Set records not the bills and the debates but the implementation of policy and the studies and investigations commissioned by Congress. Other cool Serial Set entries include a multi-volume study for the trans-continental railroad and the Titanic investigation.