New Directions in the History of Education – serie

Winner of the 2021 Society of Professors of Education Outstanding Book AwardHistorically, Americans of all stripes have concurred that teachers were essential to the success of the public schools and nation. However, they have also concurred that public school teachers were to blame for the failures of the schools and identified professionalization as a panacea. In Blaming Teachers, Diana D'Amico Pawlewicz reveals that historical professionalization reforms subverted public school teachers’ professional legitimacy. Superficially, professionalism connotes authority, expertise, and status. Professionalization for teachers never unfolded this way; rather, it was a policy process fueled by blame where others identified teachers’ shortcomings. Policymakers, school leaders, and others understood professionalization measures for teachers as efficient ways to bolster the growing bureaucratic order of the public schools through regulation and standardization. Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century with the rise of municipal public school systems and reaching into the 1980s, Blaming Teachers traces the history of professionalization policies and the discourses of blame that sustained them.

Winner of the 2021 Society of Professors of Education Outstanding Book AwardHistorically, Americans of all stripes have concurred that teachers were essential to the success of the public schools and nation. However, they have also concurred that public school teachers were to blame for the failures of the schools and identified professionalization as a panacea. In Blaming Teachers, Diana D'Amico Pawlewicz reveals that historical professionalization reforms subverted public school teachers’ professional legitimacy. Superficially, professionalism connotes authority, expertise, and status. Professionalization for teachers never unfolded this way; rather, it was a policy process fueled by blame where others identified teachers’ shortcomings. Policymakers, school leaders, and others understood professionalization measures for teachers as efficient ways to bolster the growing bureaucratic order of the public schools through regulation and standardization. Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century with the rise of municipal public school systems and reaching into the 1980s, Blaming Teachers traces the history of professionalization policies and the discourses of blame that sustained them.

Higher education hails Asian American students as model minorities who face no educational barriers given their purported cultural values of hard work and political passivity. Described as “over-represented,” Asian Americans have been overlooked in discussions about diversity; however, racial hostility continues to affect Asian American students, and they have actively challenged their invisibility in minority student discussions. This study details the history of Asian American student activism at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, as students rejected the university’s definition of minority student needs that relied on a model minority myth, measures of under-representation, and a Black-White racial model, concepts that made them an “unseen unheard minority.” This activism led to the creation on campus of one of the largest Asian American Studies programs and Asian American cultural centers in the Midwest. Their histories reveal the limitations of understanding minority student needs solely along measures of under-representation and the realities of race for Asian American college students.

Higher education hails Asian American students as model minorities who face no educational barriers given their purported cultural values of hard work and political passivity. Described as “over-represented,” Asian Americans have been overlooked in discussions about diversity; however, racial hostility continues to affect Asian American students, and they have actively challenged their invisibility in minority student discussions. This study details the history of Asian American student activism at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, as students rejected the university’s definition of minority student needs that relied on a model minority myth, measures of under-representation, and a Black-White racial model, concepts that made them an “unseen unheard minority.” This activism led to the creation on campus of one of the largest Asian American Studies programs and Asian American cultural centers in the Midwest. Their histories reveal the limitations of understanding minority student needs solely along measures of under-representation and the realities of race for Asian American college students.

Between 1970 and 1985, lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) educators publicly left their classroom closets, formed communities, and began advocating for a place of openness and safety for LGB people in America's schools. They fought for protection and representation in the National Education Association and American Federation of Teachers, as well as building community and advocacy in major gay and lesbian teacher organizations in New York, Los Angeles, and Northern California. In so doing, LGB teachers went from being a profoundly demonized and silenced population that suffered as symbolically emblematic of the harmful “bad teacher” to being an organized community of professionals deserving of rights, capable of speaking for themselves, and often able to reframe themselves as “good teachers.” This prescient book shows how LGB teachers and their allies broadened the boundaries of professionalism, negotiated for employment protection, and fought against political opponents who wanted them pushed out of America's schools altogether.

Between 1970 and 1985, lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) educators publicly left their classroom closets, formed communities, and began advocating for a place of openness and safety for LGB people in America's schools. They fought for protection and representation in the National Education Association and American Federation of Teachers, as well as building community and advocacy in major gay and lesbian teacher organizations in New York, Los Angeles, and Northern California. In so doing, LGB teachers went from being a profoundly demonized and silenced population that suffered as symbolically emblematic of the harmful “bad teacher” to being an organized community of professionals deserving of rights, capable of speaking for themselves, and often able to reframe themselves as “good teachers.” This prescient book shows how LGB teachers and their allies broadened the boundaries of professionalism, negotiated for employment protection, and fought against political opponents who wanted them pushed out of America's schools altogether.

Race and Place considers the everyday experiences of community members throughout the process of school desegregation and how race, place, and truth came to matter in this process in Prince George’s County, Maryland, from 1945 through 1973. The book is organized around several successive policies that emerged in this time: school equalization, school choice, neighborhood schools, school construction, school closure, busing for racial integration, and school discipline. Dougherty shows how these policies contained and reinforced assumptions about place and created new racial truths about people and schooling.

Race and Place considers the everyday experiences of community members throughout the process of school desegregation and how race, place, and truth came to matter in this process in Prince George’s County, Maryland, from 1945 through 1973. The book is organized around several successive policies that emerged in this time: school equalization, school choice, neighborhood schools, school construction, school closure, busing for racial integration, and school discipline. Dougherty shows how these policies contained and reinforced assumptions about place and created new racial truths about people and schooling.

Liberation and Education brings together a collection of essays about Black educators' and organizations' quests to cultivate and employ educational strategies for the liberation of Black people. The contributions examine the enduring nature of Black people's thinking about education prior to and through enslavement to the present. It documents a variety of critical accounts of how Black people have developed ways to free themselves mentally from the legacies of slavery, the view of Black inferiority, and historical and systemic racism.

Liberation and Education brings together a collection of essays about Black educators' and organizations' quests to cultivate and employ educational strategies for the liberation of Black people. The contributions examine the enduring nature of Black people's thinking about education prior to and through enslavement to the present. It documents a variety of critical accounts of how Black people have developed ways to free themselves mentally from the legacies of slavery, the view of Black inferiority, and historical and systemic racism.

Since the nine-month school year became common in the United States during the 1880s, schoolteachers have never really had summers off. Administrators instructed them to rest, as well as to study and travel, in the interest of creating a compliant workforce. Teachers, however, adapted administrators’ directives to pursue their own version of professionalization and to ensure their financial well-being. Summers Off explores teachers’ summer experiences between the 1880s and 1930s in institutes and association meetings; sessions at teachers colleges, Black colleges, and prestigious universities; work for wages or their family; tourism in the U.S. and Europe; and activities intended to be restful. This heretofore untold history reveals how teachers utilized the geographical and psychological distance from the classroom that summer provided, to enhance not only their teaching skills but also their professional and intellectual independence, their membership in the middle class, and, in the cases of women and Black teachers, their defiance of gender and race hierarchies.

Since the nine-month school year became common in the United States during the 1880s, schoolteachers have never really had summers off. Administrators instructed them to rest, as well as to study and travel, in the interest of creating a compliant workforce. Teachers, however, adapted administrators’ directives to pursue their own version of professionalization and to ensure their financial well-being. Summers Off explores teachers’ summer experiences between the 1880s and 1930s in institutes and association meetings; sessions at teachers colleges, Black colleges, and prestigious universities; work for wages or their family; tourism in the U.S. and Europe; and activities intended to be restful. This heretofore untold history reveals how teachers utilized the geographical and psychological distance from the classroom that summer provided, to enhance not only their teaching skills but also their professional and intellectual independence, their membership in the middle class, and, in the cases of women and Black teachers, their defiance of gender and race hierarchies.

An Age of Accountability highlights the role of test-based accountability as a policy framework in American education from 1970 to 2020. For more than half a century, the quest to hold schools and educators accountable for academic achievement has relied almost exclusively on standardized assessment. The theory of change embedded in almost all test-based accountability programs held that assessment with stipulated consequences could lead to major improvements in schools. This was accomplished politically by proclaiming lofty goals of attaining universal proficiency and closing achievement gaps, which repeatedly failed to materialize. But even after very clear disappointments, no other policy framework has emerged to challenge its hegemony. The American public today has little confidence in institutions to improve the quality of goods and services they provide, especially in the public sector. As a consequence, many Americans continue to believe that accountability remains a vital necessity, even if educators and policy scholars disagree.

An Age of Accountability highlights the role of test-based accountability as a policy framework in American education from 1970 to 2020. For more than half a century, the quest to hold schools and educators accountable for academic achievement has relied almost exclusively on standardized assessment. The theory of change embedded in almost all test-based accountability programs held that assessment with stipulated consequences could lead to major improvements in schools. This was accomplished politically by proclaiming lofty goals of attaining universal proficiency and closing achievement gaps, which repeatedly failed to materialize. But even after very clear disappointments, no other policy framework has emerged to challenge its hegemony. The American public today has little confidence in institutions to improve the quality of goods and services they provide, especially in the public sector. As a consequence, many Americans continue to believe that accountability remains a vital necessity, even if educators and policy scholars disagree.

Youth in the Movements documents the history of the rise of American high school and youth activism in the United States since the Second World War. Spaces within high schools and the adults at them provided support or inspiration – both negative and positive – for youth engaged in protest, organizing, and activism. Through rich research of archival sources and oral histories, contributors reveal new perspectives on American high school and youth activism. Viewed through the eyes of high school-aged youth around the United States – in familiar locations such as Boston, New York City, and Detroit, as well as less familiar locales in the historiography, such as Salt Lake City and the Navajo Reservation – we extend our understanding of high school and how it has been experienced by youth activists in the post-World War II period.

Youth in the Movements documents the history of the rise of American high school and youth activism in the United States since the Second World War. Spaces within high schools and the adults at them provided support or inspiration – both negative and positive – for youth engaged in protest, organizing, and activism. Through rich research of archival sources and oral histories, contributors reveal new perspectives on American high school and youth activism. Viewed through the eyes of high school-aged youth around the United States – in familiar locations such as Boston, New York City, and Detroit, as well as less familiar locales in the historiography, such as Salt Lake City and the Navajo Reservation – we extend our understanding of high school and how it has been experienced by youth activists in the post-World War II period.

Constructing a Black Curriculum reframes how we understand Black Americans' intellectual and political engagement with education during the first half of the twentieth century. It traces the powerful, diffuse movement created by Black Americans to build what Nocera calls a "Black Curriculum:" a communal effort to represent Black identity, guide racial consciousness, and rebut claims of inferiority. This curriculum first developed as a public educational project in Black learned societies and during the Harlem Renaissance before making its way into schools. The struggle for a Black curriculum was not only a fight against white supremacy, but also an internal debate among Black advocates over the very nature of how race should be represented and taught. This book illuminates this struggle through the work of Black intellectuals (Alexander Crummell, Carter G. Woodson, Hubert Harrison, and Alain Locke) and the intellectual contributions of African American educators (Nannie Burroughs, Jane Dabney Shackelford, and Julia Davis). This essential history provides vital context for contemporary debates over curriculum reform, racial knowledge, and the enduring quest for educational equity.