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Massachusetts Passed First Education Law
1647This was the first law to require children to be taught to read and write. In fear that this law was being ignored by some parents, a second law was passed in 1647 that required towns with 50 or more families hire a teacher to teach their children. Of towns with 100 families or more, the people must hire a teacher to teach latin, and prepare the children to attend college. This law shows that our country has always valued education -
Thomas Jefferson proposed at least three years of school for all.
Thomas Jefferson proposes a two-track educational system, with different tracks for "the laboring and the learned."
He wanted everyone to have at least three years of school. The most able students would then be allowed to continue their education, and receive scholarships to do so. -
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Common Schools Movement
Movement to make the public school system more consistent, with schools being equal, funded by taxes, and high quality. -
Horace Mann Elected Secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education.
Horace Mann was elected to act as Secretary of the newly-created Massachusetts Board of Education in 1837. He visited over 1,000 schools in a six year period. He then pushed for school reform to make schools equal, free of charge, high quality, and funded by taxes. -
First legal case concerning integration
In 1855 The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Sarah Roberts in Roberts VS Boston, The first desegregation case in the country. It set a precedent for future integration cases. -
Committee of Ten
Committee of the ten was a group of educators that were asked to come up with a standard curriculum for the nation's high schools to prepare students for college. -
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The Measurement Movement
In the early 1900’s psychologists such as Binet, Terman, and Piaget started studying children. They came up with theories of how children learn, and ways to measure their intelligence. -
The Gary Plan and the Progressive Reform Movement
Gary PlanThe Gary Plan, modeled after John Dewey’s philosophy, was a model adopted by Gary Indiana in 1907. The motto was “work, study, play”. It was a whole child approach, with new subjects like health and home economics. This was a very modern, forward thinking model, and a lot of what they did then is still in effect and relevant today. -
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The Baby Boom
The Baby Boom spanned almost two decades. After world warII, the country saw a huge increase in population growth. With that, came a large increase in school age children. -
Brown VS Board of Education
On May 17, 1954, The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Brown in Brown VS The Board Of Education of Topeka, Kansas. The court found that state-sanctioned segregation of public schools was a violation of the 14th amendment and was therefore unconstitutional. It put an end to “separate but equal”. -
Civil Rights Act
Cilil RightsThe Civil Rights Act of 1964, passed by Lyndon Johnson, outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. Although segregation had been illegal since 1954, many schools didn’t comply. President Johnson tied federal money to this act which made it so effective. If schools didn’t comply, they lost funding. This Act has forever changed our schools for the better. It was the most important piece of legislation when it comes to student equality in our nation. -
Elementary and Secondary Education Act
The Elementary and Secondary Education Act was signed by Lyndon Johnson in 1965 to support his war on poverty. This act helped fund school programs such as Title I and bilingual education -
Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act
IDEAIDEA was passed in 1975. This Act dramatically changed the way our nation looks at children with disabilities. Before this act, children were often taken away from their families and put in institutions. Being passionate about Special Education, I feel this is the most important piece of legislation in our nation's history to me. IDEA guarantees access to a free, appropriate, public education, in the least restrictive environment. -
A Nation at Risk Report
On April 26, 1983 Ronald Reagan told the American people that our schools were failing. This began a national media frenzy, and didn’t take into account that we were educating a much more diverse population than ever before. Test scores don’t support this report, and some feel it may have been a scapegoat for a failing economy. -
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The School Choice Movement
The School Choice Movement was sparked after the Nation at Risk Report. Students and parents wanted an alternative to the monopoly of the public school system. The theory behind it is a marketplace model, competition will make the public schools better. -
No Child Left Behind
No child left behindNo Child Left Behind was President George W. Bush's education-reform bill. This piece of legislation is the biggest piece of education reform since 1965. It increased funding for schools with high numbers of poor and minority students. It also dramatically increased the role of standard testing and punishes schools and teachers whose students don’t perform well on these tests. The focus of education switched to teaching to the test, and decreased the amount of arts and other non-core subjects.
