In June 2008, Albert Sidney Johnston High School (JHS) in the Austin Independent School District (AISD) became the first school in the state of Texas to be closed by the Commissioner of the Texas Education Agency (TEA) after receiving ratings of academically unacceptable for five consecutive years under the Texas public school accountability…

In 2012, Denver Public School District superintendent Tom Boasberg wrote to his employees about the state of their schools: "Yet there's a great deal of work ahead because our gaps still aren't closing at all. They remain strikingly and distressingly similar to the national data. Our schools still aren't the equalizing force that they need to…

Over the past century, American schools have been the focus of researchers and educators seeking to improve the education of the country's children. Few studies, though, have examined what the schools--their physical presence and the changes within them--have meant to the students who attended those schools (Currens 2017; Kilinc and Burlbaw 2011;…

In the early twentieth century St. Louis' public schools for Black children enjoyed a robust reputation, perhaps second only to those in the nation's capital. Herman H. Dreer, a "public school man," provided direction for those institutions similarly called to lead various segments and forces within the larger Black community…

Robert Burns Eleazer (1877-1973), a liberal white Methodist from Tennessee, served as the education director and director of publicity of the Atlanta-based Commission on Interracial Cooperation (CIC) from 1922 to 1942. As education director, he developed a strategy for improving race relations which entailed offering prizes to young people in the…

In 1955, the General Convention of the Episcopal Church called for the racial desegregation of Episcopal institutions: parishes, seminaries, and schools. The study of Episcopal school desegregation reveals a fundamental paradox: Episcopal theology promoted desegregation but "white flight" spurred Episcopal school growth. The question of…

In 2017, one of the largest investments in education reform in California's history came to an end. The James Irvine Foundation announced that it was shifting its investment focus from Linked Learning, a college and career readiness high school reform, to other projects (Linked Learning Alliance 2017). Unlike the Gates Foundation's well-publicized…

The Atlanta Urban Debate League was established in 1985 as an after school program focused on providing debate outreach to high school students in the Atlanta public schools. Still in operation today, volunteers work with current students in public middle and high schools in Atlanta, supporting students as they practice reading, writing, speaking…

This paper analyzes several elementary and middle school textbooks, educational decrees, and other primary sources to help shed light on how schooling, and more generally education, during what would be known as the "Reign of the Colonels" or "Military 'Junta'" attempted to reshape a Greek national identity. This paper seeks to…

The year 1968 denotes a particularly salient moment in American history, not least because it marks the year in which the Civil Rights movement lost its charismatic leader, Martin Luther King, Jr. The assassination of King on April 4, 1968, resulted in widespread and spontaneous uprisings across the country, including one in Kansas City. Not…

Within two weeks of the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the U.S. Office of Education Wartime Commission was formed to provide guidance to institutions of higher learning and public schools for the duration of the war. The goals set for the commission included: (1) facilitating the adjustment of education agencies to war needs; (2) informing government…

Central High School in Kansas City, Missouri is one of the oldest schools west of the Mississippi and the first public high school built in Kansas City. Kansas City's magnet plan resulted in Central High School being rebuilt as the Central Computers Unlimited/Classical Greek Magnet High School, a school that was designed to offer students an…

This essay will discuss two educational programs to improve the living conditions of students from low income families that Pedro T. Orata conducted during the middle years of the twentieth century. The question this paper will investigate is whether Orata considered the people he was trying to help as being trapped by the conditions of poverty to…

From the moment the United States entered World War II, public schools across the nation bombarded the Office of Education Wartime Commission requesting advice on how to mobilize schools for the war effort. American schools would rise to the occasion, implementing numerous programs including pre-induction training and the Victory Corps. The…

One of the most well-known and infamous student protests was the Kent State University shootings of 1970. The aftermath of the Kent State tragedy gave rise to protests and riots on hundreds of college and university campuses across the nation. In the American South, only ten days after the Kent Sate tragedy, a very similar incident occurred on the…