Mother Tongue
A Brief History of Alternative Education
by Ron Miller
Why are there "alternative" schools? Our system of public schooling was first organized in the 1830's to provide a common, culturally unifying educational experience for all children, yet from the very beginning, certain groups of educators, parents, and students themselves have declined to participate in this system. Their reasons are various, and the forms of schooling--and nonschooling--that they have chosen instead are equally diverse. The history of alternative education is a colorful story of social reformers and individualists, religious believers and romantics; despite their differences, however, they share an especially strong interest in young people's social, moral, emotional and intellectual development, and, more deliberately than most public school programs, they have practiced educational approaches that aim primarily to nourish these qualities.
Historians of public education have described how, during the period between 1837 (when Horace Mann became the first powerful leader of a state education agency) and the early twentieth century (when new scientific theories were applied to psychology, learning, and organizational management), a particularly narrow model of schooling became solidly established as the "one best system" of public education. According to this model, the purpose of schooling was to overcome cultural diversity and personal uniqueness in order to mold a loyal citizenry and an effective workforce for the growing industrial system. Education aimed primarily to discipline the developing energies of young people for the sake of political and social uniformity as well as the success of the emerging corporate economy. In the early twentieth century, these goals were concisely expressed by the term "social efficiency," which was often used by educational leaders.
Many people are attracted to alternative schools and home education because they feel that this agenda of
by Ron Miller
Why are there "alternative" schools? Our system of public schooling was first organized in the 1830's to provide a common, culturally unifying educational experience for all children, yet from the very beginning, certain groups of educators, parents, and students themselves have declined to participate in this system. Their reasons are various, and the forms of schooling--and nonschooling--that they have chosen instead are equally diverse. The history of alternative education is a colorful story of social reformers and individualists, religious believers and romantics; despite their differences, however, they share an especially strong interest in young people's social, moral, emotional and intellectual development, and, more deliberately than most public school programs, they have practiced educational approaches that aim primarily to nourish these qualities.
Historians of public education have described how, during the period between 1837 (when Horace Mann became the first powerful leader of a state education agency) and the early twentieth century (when new scientific theories were applied to psychology, learning, and organizational management), a particularly narrow model of schooling became solidly established as the "one best system" of public education. According to this model, the purpose of schooling was to overcome cultural diversity and personal uniqueness in order to mold a loyal citizenry and an effective workforce for the growing industrial system. Education aimed primarily to discipline the developing energies of young people for the sake of political and social uniformity as well as the success of the emerging corporate economy. In the early twentieth century, these goals were concisely expressed by the term "social efficiency," which was often used by educational leaders.
Many people are attracted to alternative schools and home education because they feel that this agenda of