Labaree contends that this compromise between access and exclusivity does not work: it fails to serve the public interest because of the attenuation of the school's democratic goals, and it fails to serve private interests because of the declining value of the credentials it bestows. This in turn spurred the school to protect its credentials by introducing tracking, with a new dual curriculum for college-bound and non college-bound students. The resulting rapid expansion of Centrals' enrollment and the establishment of other public high schools eventually undermined the selectivity that had made its credentials so valuable and enabled it to flourish.
However, the school's success in providing advantages for its graduates led, during the 1880s, to growing public demand for secondary education. The struggle between these two goals-one leading to political equality and the other reinforcing economic inequality-has characterized its history ever since, says Labaree.Īccording to Labaree, Central was founded as a selective middle-class school with broad moral and political aims. Labaree argues that the American public high school can be viewed as the product of both democratic politics and capitalist markets: although it was originally intended to produce informed citizens for the new republic, the high school, with its meritocratic emphasis, instead became a vehicle for conferring status on the select group that was educated there. Throughout these discussions, Labaree maintains an ambivalent position about education schools-admiring their dedication and critiquing their mediocrity, their romantic rhetoric, and their compliant attitudes.How have the educational goals of American public high schools changed over time? What can the experiences of one secondary school tell us about the problems they all face today? This book provides an analytical history of the origins and development of Central High School, the first high school in Philadelphia and a model for many subsequent institutions. And he looks at the consequences of the ed school's attachment to educational progressivism.
He notes the special problems faced by ed schools as they prepare teachers and produce research and researchers. Labaree explains how the poor reputation of the ed school has had important repercussions, shaping the quality of its programs, its recruitment, and the public response to the knowledge it offers. In this book a sociologist and historian of education examines the historical developments and contemporary factors that have resulted in the unenviable status of ed schools, offering valuable insights into the problems of these beleaguered institutions.ĭavid F. They are portrayed as intellectual wastelands, as impractical and irrelevant, as the root cause of bad teaching and inadequate learning. American schools of education get little respect.
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