Before 1870, fewer than half of American children went to school. One-room schoolhouses with all age levels being taught together by one teacher was the norm. As industry grew, people realized that the nation would benefit from having an educated workforce; as a result, states would push to improve education at all levels. This post will examine how education reform swept the nation.
In 1852, Massachusetts would pave the way for compulsory education by law. Compulsory education is what we in the U.S. continue to have--children up to a certain age are required by law to attend school. Other states followed suit and most states would require children up to age 16 to remain in school, changing from no age requirement and no compulsory attendance. The public school would become popularized at this time. Due to the rise of public schools and compulsory education, more youths would stay in school and graduate. Higher education would expand as a result of increased availability to education; both state-funded universities and privately-funded colleges for both men and women would increase in number.
One major proponent of compulsory education was Horace Mann, who was the Secretary of the Massachusetts State Board of Education and a member of the U.S. House of Representatives. Mann believed that education should be universal, non-sectarian, free, and that it should aim to educate the child as a whole person--to teach them the reading, writing, and math skills they would need for everyday life but to also teach them civic virtue and character so they would be well-rounded, functioning members of society.
Education for adults would also rise during this time, usually in the form of libraries and religious education. Teachers also taught immigrants how to speak English and how to read, write, and perform necessary mathematic functions.
As education became more widespread, so too did literacy rates increase. As more people learned to read and write, they began to do these for pleasure. Low-priced paperbacks about the "Wild West" and "rags-to-riches" stories became popular; realistic fiction would become popular as well, propelling authors such as Upton Sinclair, Mark Twain, and others to fame.
Newspapers and their readership began to take off at this time as a direct result of higher literacy rates. However, newspapers were not always informational pieces; this time period saw one of the greatest feuds between editors--William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer. Hearst was the editor-in-chief of the "New York Journal" and Pulitzer was the editor-in-chief of the "New York World"; both competed to be the best-selling newspaper of the later 19th century, and they did this via yellow journalism--sensationalizing and embellishing the stories (or making them up altogether). This will be covered in-depth in a future post, but I wanted to set up the information here first.
The growth of an educated populace would propel the U.S. and further push it to become the global superpower of the 19th and early 20th century.
In 1852, Massachusetts would pave the way for compulsory education by law. Compulsory education is what we in the U.S. continue to have--children up to a certain age are required by law to attend school. Other states followed suit and most states would require children up to age 16 to remain in school, changing from no age requirement and no compulsory attendance. The public school would become popularized at this time. Due to the rise of public schools and compulsory education, more youths would stay in school and graduate. Higher education would expand as a result of increased availability to education; both state-funded universities and privately-funded colleges for both men and women would increase in number.
One major proponent of compulsory education was Horace Mann, who was the Secretary of the Massachusetts State Board of Education and a member of the U.S. House of Representatives. Mann believed that education should be universal, non-sectarian, free, and that it should aim to educate the child as a whole person--to teach them the reading, writing, and math skills they would need for everyday life but to also teach them civic virtue and character so they would be well-rounded, functioning members of society.
Education for adults would also rise during this time, usually in the form of libraries and religious education. Teachers also taught immigrants how to speak English and how to read, write, and perform necessary mathematic functions.
As education became more widespread, so too did literacy rates increase. As more people learned to read and write, they began to do these for pleasure. Low-priced paperbacks about the "Wild West" and "rags-to-riches" stories became popular; realistic fiction would become popular as well, propelling authors such as Upton Sinclair, Mark Twain, and others to fame.
Newspapers and their readership began to take off at this time as a direct result of higher literacy rates. However, newspapers were not always informational pieces; this time period saw one of the greatest feuds between editors--William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer. Hearst was the editor-in-chief of the "New York Journal" and Pulitzer was the editor-in-chief of the "New York World"; both competed to be the best-selling newspaper of the later 19th century, and they did this via yellow journalism--sensationalizing and embellishing the stories (or making them up altogether). This will be covered in-depth in a future post, but I wanted to set up the information here first.
The growth of an educated populace would propel the U.S. and further push it to become the global superpower of the 19th and early 20th century.
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