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Organized Teachers and Educational Reform During the Progressive Era: 1890–1920

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 February 2017

Wayne Urban
Wayne Urban*
Affiliation:
Georgia State University
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Extract

One topic that has been largely neglected in the “renaissance” of educational history in the past two decades is the teacher. This essay seeks to remedy that neglect through a consideration of some organized teacher activities in three cities during the Progressive Era. Previous studies of progressivism and progressive education such as Lawrence Cremin's volume or the recent revisionist collection of essays by Clarence Karier, Paul Violas, and Joe Spring have paid little or no attention to teacher activities.

Type
Article II
Information
History of Education Quarterly , Volume 16 , Issue 1 , Spring 1976 , pp. 35 - 52
Copyright
Copyright © 1976 by New York University

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References

Notes

1. Teacher activities in periods other than the Progressive Era are beginning to be noticed by historians; for example see Finkelstein, Barbara, “Autobiographies on Schooling and School Teaching,” History of Education Quarterly, 14 (Summer, 1974): 293–300, and Clifford, Geraldine Joncich, “Saints, Sinners and People: A Position Paper on the Historiography of American Education,” History of Education Quarterly, 15 (Fall, 1975): 257–272.Google Scholar

2. Cremin, Lawrence A., The Transformation of the School (New York, 1961) and Karier, Clarence, Violas, Paul, and Spring, Joel, Roots of Crisis (Chicago, 1973).Google Scholar

3. For work in political history which clarifies the concept of progressivism see Buenker, John D., “The Progressive Era: A Search for Synthesis,” Mid-America, 51 (July, 1969): 175–93, and Filene, Peter D., “An Obituary for the Progressive Movement,” American Quarterly, 22 (Spring, 1970): 20–34. For a criticism of Cremin's definition of progressivism, see Spring, Joel, “Education and Progressivism,” History of Education Quarterly, 10 (Spring, 1970): 53–71.Google Scholar

4. Reid, Robert L., “The Professionalization of Public School Teachers: The Chicago Experience,” (unpublished doctoral dissertation, Northwestern University, 1968) and Wiebe, Robert H., The Search for Order (New York, 1967).Google Scholar

5. Tyack, David B., The One Best System (Cambridge, Mass, 1974), pp. 255–68 and Huthmacher, J. Joseph, “Urban Liberalism and the Age of Reform,” Mississippi Valley Historical Review, 49 (September, 1962): 231–41.Google Scholar

6. For a discussion of Rice's views, especially on New York, see Ravitch, Diane, The Great School Wars (New York, 1974), pp. 128–29.Google Scholar

7. Ibid., pp. 115–18.Google Scholar

8. Ibid., pp. 132–33.Google Scholar

9. Ibid., pp. 145, 154–55.Google Scholar

10. Hammack, David C., “The Centralization of New York City's Public School System,” (unpublished master's thesis, Columbia University, 1969), pp. 110, 123.Google Scholar

11. Ibid., p. 92.Google Scholar

12. Ibid., pp. 113–17.Google Scholar

13. Ibid., pp. 112, 121–22.Google Scholar

14. For another look at reformers that supports the insights of Ravitch and Hammack, see Cohen, Sol, Progressives and Urban School Reform (New York, 1964).Google Scholar

15. Herrick, Mary J., The Chicago Schools: A Social and Political History (Beverly Hills, California, 1971), pp. 83–6.Google Scholar

16. Ibid., pp. 121–22 and Reid, , “Professionalization,” pp. 51–6.Google Scholar

17. Reid, , “Professionalization,” pp. 85–8.Google Scholar

18. Hammack, , “Centralization of New York City Schools,” p. 121 mentions autonomy but does not document the concept. For Ravitch's description of the situation under decentralized control, see her paper “Local Control in the New York City Schools, 1842–1896,” (unpublished paper, Southern History of Education Society, History of Education Society Joint Meeting, Atlanta, November 16, 1974).Google Scholar

19. Reid, , “Professionalization,” pp. 53, 59, 118, and Herrick, , Chicago Schools, p. 139.Google Scholar

20. Tyack, David B., “City Schools: Centralization of Control at the Turn of the Century,” in Israel, Jerry, ed., Building the Organizational Society (New York, 1972), p. 70.Google Scholar

21. A lengthier account of the Guinn board and the controversy it caused can be found in my unpublished paper, “Teachers, Labor and Progressivism: The Early Years of the Atlanta Public School Teachers' Association.” For a Sketch of Guinn's career, see Ecke, Melvin, From Ivy Street to Kennedy Center: Centennial History of the Atlanta Public School System (Atlanta Board of Education, 1972), p. 83.Google Scholar

22. Parrish, C. S., Survey of the Atlanta Public Schools (Atlanta, 1914), recently reprinted by the Atlanta Public Schools. For a sketch of Parrish's career, see Strickland, Charles E., “Parrish, Celestia,” in James, Edward T., ed., Notable American Women (Cambridge, 1971), Volume III, Part 2, pp. 18–19.Google Scholar

23. Atlanta Journal, (June 8, 1918).Google Scholar

24. Ibid., (June 7, 1915) and Atlanta Constitution, (March 26, 1915).Google Scholar

25. For an account of the Women's School Improvement Association, see Racine, Philip N., “Atlanta's Schools: A History of the Public School System,” (unpublished doctoral dissertation, Emory University, 1969), pp. 145–47.Google Scholar

26. “Evidence and Proceedings Before a Special Committee of Five, Appointed Under a Resolution of City Council,” (1918), pp. 152–159, 396. This document can be found in the offices of the Clerk of City Council of the City of Atlanta.Google Scholar

27. Urban, , “Teachers, Labor and Progressivism,” Section VI.Google Scholar

28. Ravitch, , Great School Wars, pp. 192–95.Google Scholar

29. Ibid., p. 203. For other accounts of the Gary plan in New York, see Cohen, Sol, Progressives and Urban School Reform and Mohl, Raymond A., “Schools, Politics, and Riots: The Gary Plan in New York City, 1914–1917,” Pedagogica Historica, 15 (June, 1975): 46–79.Google Scholar

30. Ravitch, , Great School Wars, p. 197.Google Scholar

31. Ibid., pp. 205–06.Google Scholar

32. Ibid., pp. 204–05.Google Scholar

33. Ibid., pp. 206, 214, 225.Google Scholar

34. Ibid., p. 214.Google Scholar

35. Ravitch, , Great School Wars, pp. 189–91; and Hays, Samuel P., “The Politics of Reform in Municipal Government in the Progressive Era,” Pacific Northwest Quarterly, 55 (October, 1964): 157–69. Tyack, , One Best System, p. 196.Google Scholar

36. Callahan, Raymond E., Education and the Cult of Efficiency (Chicago, 1962) has only one reference under the term “progressivism” in the index and that reference cites a description of the muckrakers. For Tyack's description of administrative progressivism, see The One Best System, pp. 182–93. For Hays's municipal reformers, see “The Politics of Reform in Municipal Government.”Google Scholar

37. Tyack, , One Best System, p. 197. For mention of the darker side of progressivism, see Katz, Michael B., Class Bureaucracy and Schools (New York, 1971), p. 118. For administrative and pedagogical reform as it was practiced in Chicago in the 1920's, see Counts, George S., School and Society in Chicago (New York, 1928).Google Scholar

38. Ravitch, , Great School Wars, p. 168. For references on progressivism and progressive education, see Note 3.Google Scholar

39. Wiebe, , Search for Order, pp. 119–20.Google Scholar

40. Reid, , “Professionalization,” Chapters 3 and 4 and Hays, , “Politics of Municipal Government Reform.”Google Scholar

41. Tyack, , One Best System, p. 262 and Huthmacher, J. Joseph, “Urban Liberalism and the Age of Reform.”Google Scholar

42. Buenker, John D., “The Progressive Era: A Search for Synthesis.” Also, see Buenker, , Urban Liberalism and Progressive Reform (New York, 1973).Google Scholar

43. Reid, , “Professionalization,” pp. 79–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

44. Issel, William, “Teachers and Educational Reform during the Progressive Era: A Case Study of the Pittsburgh Teachers Association,” History of Education Quarterly, 1 (Summer, 1967): 220–33.Google Scholar