19th century schools
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In a message dated 9/13/01 10:17:31 PM, shantinik@... writes:
<< Actually, I think they would be appalled most by the "socialism of the
rich"
that has ruled this country since around 1870, and set up a school system so
that they could off-load their training needs, and their need to ensure a
docile, malleable workforce on to us, and so we would pay for our own
enslavement. >>
This vision of the origins of the school system might be somewhat true in the
industrial northeast, but they are NOT "truth" for the whole U.S. or for all
early schools.
The local school boards and one-room school houses in Texas and the Southwest
(those I'm most familiar with from family accounts and from reading about
local history, and from familiarity with the state college systems in
neighboring states) were grassroots, local-moving-toward territorial- or
statewide schools. Locals decided to build a school--not with tax money, but
with logs or adobe or whatever. They built it and someone taught. Often
local, younger women. Partly for room and board, sometimes. Those who
wanted to teach went to the state's "normal school" for teacher training and
certification.
They wanted to teach people to read and know about the world outside the area
they lived in. They weren't training factory workers nor any other kinds of
slaves. They were teaching people about the U.S. because they either were
newly made citizens or were hoping to become a state.
I'm not sorry John Taylor Gatto and others are exposing the underbelly of
some of the early writings in their area, but the story of the influx of
European immigrants to the urban Northeast during the industrial heyday is
not the same as the history of public education in the United States of
America.
Sandra
"Everything counts."
http://expage.com/SandraDoddArticles
http://expage.com/SandraDodd
<< Actually, I think they would be appalled most by the "socialism of the
rich"
that has ruled this country since around 1870, and set up a school system so
that they could off-load their training needs, and their need to ensure a
docile, malleable workforce on to us, and so we would pay for our own
enslavement. >>
This vision of the origins of the school system might be somewhat true in the
industrial northeast, but they are NOT "truth" for the whole U.S. or for all
early schools.
The local school boards and one-room school houses in Texas and the Southwest
(those I'm most familiar with from family accounts and from reading about
local history, and from familiarity with the state college systems in
neighboring states) were grassroots, local-moving-toward territorial- or
statewide schools. Locals decided to build a school--not with tax money, but
with logs or adobe or whatever. They built it and someone taught. Often
local, younger women. Partly for room and board, sometimes. Those who
wanted to teach went to the state's "normal school" for teacher training and
certification.
They wanted to teach people to read and know about the world outside the area
they lived in. They weren't training factory workers nor any other kinds of
slaves. They were teaching people about the U.S. because they either were
newly made citizens or were hoping to become a state.
I'm not sorry John Taylor Gatto and others are exposing the underbelly of
some of the early writings in their area, but the story of the influx of
European immigrants to the urban Northeast during the industrial heyday is
not the same as the history of public education in the United States of
America.
Sandra
"Everything counts."
http://expage.com/SandraDoddArticles
http://expage.com/SandraDodd
David Albert
SandraDodd@... wrote:
industrial school systems set up in the U.S. after 1870, and especially after the
establishment of graduate schools of education at U.Chicago, Columbia,
Carnegie-Mellon, and Harvard by Rockefeller, Morgan, and Carnegie.
But I also don't think you can deny that this system of education has overwhelmed
the community-based, community-run, community subscribed, often one-room
schoolhouse that existed in the northeast prior to 1860, and in the rest of the
country to much later.
I live out here in the west, and I'd be hard-pressed to see any sign of these
earlier systems out here where I live other than bake sales.
Call it the victory of the socialism of the rich, if you will.
david
> In a message dated 9/13/01 10:17:31 PM, shantinik@... writes:Sandra -- absolutely true. And indeed, my comments are specifically about the
>
> << Actually, I think they would be appalled most by the "socialism of the
> rich"
> that has ruled this country since around 1870, and set up a school system so
> that they could off-load their training needs, and their need to ensure a
> docile, malleable workforce on to us, and so we would pay for our own
> enslavement. >>
>
> This vision of the origins of the school system might be somewhat true in the
> industrial northeast, but they are NOT "truth" for the whole U.S. or for all
> early schools.
industrial school systems set up in the U.S. after 1870, and especially after the
establishment of graduate schools of education at U.Chicago, Columbia,
Carnegie-Mellon, and Harvard by Rockefeller, Morgan, and Carnegie.
But I also don't think you can deny that this system of education has overwhelmed
the community-based, community-run, community subscribed, often one-room
schoolhouse that existed in the northeast prior to 1860, and in the rest of the
country to much later.
I live out here in the west, and I'd be hard-pressed to see any sign of these
earlier systems out here where I live other than bake sales.
Call it the victory of the socialism of the rich, if you will.
david