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Period: to
1600s
Informal family education, apprenticeships, dame schools, tutors -
Boston Latin Grammar School
Boston Latin School is the oldest school in America. The curriculum of the school is centered in the humanities, its founders sharing with the ancient Greeks the belief that the only good things are the goods of the soul. Source -
Harvard College
Harvard is the oldest institution of higher education in the United States, established in 1636 by vote of the Great and General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
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"New England Primer" published
The first reading primer designed for the American colonies was The New-England Primer first issued in Boston, Massachusetts between 1687 and 1690 by English printer and publisher Benjamin Harris, who came to Boston, Massachusetts in 1687 to escape the brief Catholic ascendancy under James II.
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Period: to
1700s
Development of a national interest in education, state responsibility for education, growth in secondary education -
South Carolina Denies Education to Blacks
Fearing that black literacy would prove a threat to the slave system -- which relied on slaves' dependence on masters -- whites in many colonies instituted laws forbidding slaves to learn to read or write and making it a crime for others to teach them.
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Opening of the Franklin Academy in Philadelphia
The curriculum represented a divide between the majority of the trustees and Benjamin Franklin regarding the nature of the education to be provided.
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Period: to
1800s
Increasing role of public secondary schools, increased but segregated education for women and minorities, attention to the field of education and teacher preparation -
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First public high school opens in Boston
The Committee passed a resolution in 1820 that authorized the creation of a public secondary school to educate boys with an emphasis on a strong course of study in the English language. In 1821, English Classical School was opened with an enrollment of 101 boys.
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First (private) normal school opens in Vermont (Rev. Samuel Hall)
The first agricultural college in the US (as it is known officially, "The University of Vermont and State Agricultural College"), the first normal school, the first private military academy (Norwich University) and the first school specifically established for the college training of women were also in Vermont.
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Massachusetts requires public high schools
Presents the text of the Massachusetts High School Law of 1827, a law mandating that each town in the state be supplied with a high school and teachers. Provisions of the law.
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Horace Mann becomes secretary of board of education in Massachusetts 1839 First public normal school in Lexington, Massachusetts
The importance of the final principle prompted the development of "normal schools" to train teachers to follow Mann's guidelines. As such, the first of several Massachusetts state-sponsored normal schools was established in Lexington in 1839.
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First kindergarten (German language) in United States
In the United States Margarethe Schurz founded the first kindergarten in Watertown, Wisconsin, in 1856. Her German-language kindergarten impressed Elizabeth Peabody, who opened the first American English-language kindergarten in Boston in 1860.
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Morrill Land Grant College Act
Land-Grant College Act of 1862, or Morrill Act, Act of the U.S. Congress (1862) that provided grants of land to states to finance the establishment of colleges specializing in “agriculture and the mechanic arts.”
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Kalamazoo case (legalizes taxes for high schools)
Kalamazoo Union High School, which many believed to be a necessity for bridging the gap from common school to university, operated with some minor opposition, until 1873. In January of that year, three prominent Kalamazoo property owners filed a suit intended to prevent the school board from funding the high school with tax money.
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Period: to
1900s
Increasing federal support for educational rights of poor, females, minorities, and disabled; increased federal funding of specific (categorical) education programs. -
First junior high school in Berkeley, California
The first junior high school opened its doors in Berkeley, California in 1910, and by 1920 over 800 junior high schools, each containing grades 7 through 9, had opened across the country.
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Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka Supreme Court decision outlawing racial segregation in schools
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Elementary and Secondary Act (ESEA)
The federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), enacted in 1965, is the nation’s national education law and shows a longstanding commitment to equal opportunity for all students.
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Title IX prohibits sex discrimination in schools
On June 23, 1972, the President signed Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, 20 U.S.C. §1681 et seq., into law. Title IX is a comprehensive federal law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in any federally funded education program or activity.
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Public Law 94-142, Education for All Handicapped Children Act (renamed the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act), is passed (IDEA)
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Period: to
2000s
Present -
No Child Left Behind Act calls for state standards and annual testing (President George Bush)
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