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Boston Latin Grammar School
School for Boys opens -
First Public High School- Boston
Known as English School -
Law Requires Opening of Free Public High Schools
Massachusetts -
Boston Girls High School Opens
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Normal School Opens
First Schools of Education -
Diploma Admission Requirement
The University of Michigan began diploma admission as early as 1871, but this practice did not become common until accreditation became popular. -
Kalamazoo Case- Taxes for Schools
The Case
The Michigan Supreme Court (in what became known as the Kalamazoo Case) heard arguments for and against using taxes for secondary schools. The ruling favored tax support of public high schools, which subsequently became common practice throughout the United States. -
First Accreditating Agency
The New England Association of Schools and Colleges was founded in 1885 and is the oldest of the six regional accrediting agencies -
Curricular Standards
National Education Association sponsored the Committee of Ten in 1892 -
Plessy v. Ferguson
The separate but equal doctrine elucidated in the U.S. Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896 severely curtailed the development of black high schools, yet the perennial high school curriculum debate was also relevant to the education of African Americans. -
Cummings v. School Board of Richmond County, Georgia
In an 1899 decision (Cummings v. School Board of Richmond County, Georgia), the Supreme Court decided that school boards were not required to provide public secondary education for African Americans. This decision restrained the evolution of black secondary education. -
Landmark
By 1900 there were more than 6,000 high schools annually graduating 6 percent of American seventeen-year-olds -
Standardization
The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, a nonprofit corporation founded in 1906, developed the Carnegie unit as a measure of the amount of time a student had studied a subject. One Carnegie unit was equivalent to 120 hours of contact time, and fourteen units was established as the minimum for an academic high school course of study. -
Junior High Schools Established
The first junior high schools, grades seven through nine, were established in California and Ohio around 1910. -
Cardinal Principles of Education
As high school education became universal, comprehensive high schools, the committee argued, should meet the needs of the widely diverse student population. These needs could be met through varied curriculum options relevant to the lives of current students. Guidance departments would help students make appropriate selections from the available choices by determining the students' strengths and weaknesses. IQ tests would be used to determine student placement. -
Native American Boarding School Closed
Haunting of Boarding SchoolsThe Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) in Washington, D.C., was in charge of the education of American Indian youth and developed an official policy of detribalization. Many Native Americans were sent away from their families to boarding schools to be immersed in white culture and values. For example, the curriculum of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, established in 1879 and closed in 1918, was designed with the intention of transforming Native American children by focusing on the vocational s -
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Schools Become More Custodial
In the late 1920s youth unemployment emerged as a contentious political and social issue. Politicians and educators wanted students to remain in high school in order to reduce increased delinquency, crime, and political radicalization -
Landmark
In 1910, 8.8 percent of seventeen-year-olds were in high school; by 1930 this figure rose to almost 30 percent. Progressive educators took note of both this increase and that many of the students in secondary schools would not be attending college. High schools began to emphasize social and vocational skills that prepared students for later life. Social skills were necessary to assimilate the large wave of immigrants and to promote democratic ideals so that new Americans could function in socie -
Education for All American Youth, Curriculum
In 1944 the Educational Policies Commission released Education for All American Youth, a report calling for a highly practical curriculum similar to that described in the Cardinal Principles. Many feared that the economic difficulties that occurred before the war would continue after the war, so the push continued to keep students in school. American youth would not be competing for jobs with returning servicemen. -
James B. Conant begins educational publications
He noted that the comprehensive high school also allowed for student interaction among academic tracks, which facilitated the development of the social skills that are necessary in productive citizens. Conant also suggested that authorities strengthen the differentiation in secondary schools with an increased focus on the gifted. He believed talented students must be exposed to advanced classes in mathematics and science. To this end, there were a number of curricular reform efforts that found t -
Brown v. BOE
Brown v BOE
In Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, the Supreme Court unanimously struck down the Plessy v. Ferguson separate but equal ruling, arguing that the separation of children in public schools by race violates the Fourteenth Amendment. This 1954 -
Central High School, Little Rock, Arkansas
Central High
In 1957 federal troops had to be called into Little Rock, Arkansas, so that nine black students could attend the previously all-white Central High School. -
National Defense Education Act
The National Defense Education Act that was passed in 1958 provided financial aid to states for the improvement of the teaching of science, mathematics, and foreign languages. -
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Evolution of Middle Schools
Middle schools evolved in the 1960s with a new pattern–five years of elementary, three years of middle school, and four years of high school. Middle schools were designed to meet the intellectual, social, and physical needs of young adolescents rather than to help these students get ready for high school. -
A Nation at Risk published
A Nation at Risk, a report from the National Commission on Excellence in Education, published in 1983, directly tied the quality of American schooling to the strength and position of the American economy in the global marketplace. Alarmed by the economic advances made by Japan and other countries, the commission argued that schools in the United States were declining, which presented an immediate threat to the country's well-being and economic strength. -
Conflict Resolution Introduced
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NCLB
NCLB
The reauthorization of the national Elementary and Secondary Education Act, known as the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, reconfirmed this push for accountability by requiring states to develop annual testing programs for students in grades three through eight in reading and mathematics. School districts must be able to show that all students reach proficiency or will be subject to corrective procedures. -
IDEA
IDEAThe Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) is a law ensuring services to children with disabilities throughout the nation. IDEA governs how states and public agencies provide early intervention, special education and related services to more than 6.5 million eligible infants, toddlers, children and youth with disabilities.
Infants and toddlers with disabilities (birth-2) and their families receive early intervention services under IDEA Part C. Children and youth (ages 3-21) receive
