Whether the debate's about gender, race, how much you have to pay, or the color of your uniform, education in the U.S. of A has had its fair share of controversy. Not to mention plain old change, given the whole, you know, progress of time thing. Here are some key moments in the history of U.S. education that'll make you a whole lot more appreciative (or not) of the way we crack the ruler in classrooms today.

Shout out! This super-duper in-depth timeline fits in a lot of these moments and more, along with the context of U.S. history as a whole. Thanks, Prof. Sass.

1600s

Education during the colonial period was usually private (done by parents) or religious (taught by priests). It was in the early 1600s when European folks started forming colonies along the Northeast coast of what's now the U.S., and a lot of these people were fleeing religious persecution, usually because they were more religious than the powers in charge back home.

 

Yep, education existed back then.

Which meant that education in those days was as much about Christian values as spelling and grammar. Learn more about colonial-era education, and how it differed for guys and gals, here.

1636

The first university, an unknown hole-in-the-wall called Harvard College, was established in Newtowne, Massachusetts. Once it stopped being new they renamed the town Cambridge and the rest is history.

 

The Shmoop of the East.

1642

Things started getting serious: the Massachusetts General Court passed the first education law. It required parents to make sure that their kiddies could read and understand "the principles of religion and the laws of the Commonwealth." In other words, the purpose of education was to make good Christians and well-behaved citizens. Here are some more deets on education during that era and up to the mid-19th century.

1779

Well howdy, U.S. of A. The American Revolution established our star-spangled land in 1776, and three years later good ol' future prez Thomas Jefferson proposed two different tracks in education for "the laboring and the learned." This contributed to class divisions that let already richer people get better education and therefore better job opportunities—a trend that more or less continues to this day.

 

So modern.

1801

Big news. James Pillans invented the modern blackboard by hanging a big slab of slate on the classroom wall.

1821

The first government-owned/operated public high school opened in Boston, MA with the creative name of the Boston English High School. It still exists today. Read more about the establishment of public schools during the 19th century here.

 

In which everyone starts speaking English with a Boston accent.

1823

Catharine Beecher (yup, her sister Harriet wrote the anti-slavery thriller Uncle Tom's Cabin) founds the Hartford Female Seminary, one of the first major institutions allowing ladies to get an education. This was a time when girls were supposed to be taught things like cooking, needlework, and enough math to pay for milk and butter, but Ms. Beecher included traditionally "male" subjects on her curriculum, making her school one of the first places to offer higher education to women. Bully for her! (or do we mean Bully-ette?)

1837

The African Institute, which still exists with the name Cheyney University, was founded in Pennsylvania. Cheyney is the U.S.'s oldest institute of higher learning for African Americans.

1837

Another new institute: Mount Holyoke Female Seminary opened up as the first college for women in the U.S. Up till this point, higher education had been pretty much reserved for white men, so 1837 was a big year.

1851

People who weren't parents started realizing that parents weren't always the best teachers. Therefore, said a Massachusetts Teacher article, "the children must be gathered up and forced into school." And we've felt that way ever since. 

 

Look familiar?

1867

The battle for effective schooling continued. Now there was a need to institutionalize, so we see the formation of the Department of Education. Note this important year, two years after the end of the Civil War. This meant that education all over the country—including for former slaves—needed to be re-evaluated big-time.

1852-1913

During this period, school got stricter as compulsory attendance laws were adopted in every state. And the American dream of pulling a Ferris Bueller was born. Also in this period, called the "compulsory era" by this chart on U.S. education, governments made laws to create school districts, taxation for government schools, and more general curriculum structures throughout the states.

1909

Indianola Junior High School opened, which made it the first junior high school in the U.S. The 1900s was an era of increasing flexibility in schooling, as different schools based on age opened up, and questions of race and gender started getting attention. Here's an overview of various reforms in the education system through the 20th century.

1911

Maria Montessori founds the first Montessori school in Tarrytown, New York. Wait, what's a Montessori school? Don't worry, Shmoop's got you covered.

 

Next controversy: whether or not to make everyone wear these hats to school.

1925

Biology teacher John Scopes was convicted of teaching evolution to high school students in the case Tennessee v. John Scopes, otherwise known as "The Monkey Trial." The debate about teaching evolution vs. creationism remains a hot debate today.

1926

It was a dark day for high school students: the first Scholastic Aptitude Test was administered in this year. That's right, the dreaded SAT. Fun (ish) fact (if the history of standardized testing can be fun): it was based on the Army Alpha Test, which was designed to screen army recruits during World War I. Instead, it became the bane of high school students for decades to come.

1947

The Truman Commission Report, partially in response to thousands of World War II vets going to college, recommended doubling college enrollment by 1960 and establishing community colleges so that more folks could get a free public education. The age of only white, rich, males getting an education was coming to a close.

1954

Sparks of the Civil Rights Movement! In the case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, the Supreme Court outlawed racial segregation in public schools. The battle for bringing together white and black students—and fighting discrimination across the country—began (and it's not over yet: this This American Life episode talks about opportunity disparities for schools with mainly black vs. white students. It gets sad, y'all).

1957

As the saying goes: easier legislated than done. The "Little Rock Nine," a group of nine African-American students, tried to enroll at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. An angry white mob and the Arkansas National Guard (!) tried to stop them, and the army had to step in to protect them.

1964

It was an era of forcing the country to get more tolerant: The Association for Children with Learning Disabilities (now the Learning Disabilities Association of America) was formed, choosing the term "learning disability" instead of the less, um, polite words that were used previously. A whole bunch of legislation making public education free for special-needs students and developing special education programs followed.

1972

"You throw like a girl" wasn't just an insult: it was a law. The Title IX of the Education Amendments prohibited discrimination based on sex in all aspects of education (not just sports, though that's what usually gets talked about).

1982

Despite (or in some cases, because of) all these changes making schools more inclusive, some parental units wanted to teach their kiddos at home. States started changing compulsory attendance laws in the early 1980s and all states allowed homeschooling by the mid-1990s. Next step: Shmoopschooling for all.

1993

The tech age was creeping its way in. This year saw the founding of Jones International University, the first in the world to "exist entirely online."

1994

President Bill Clinton signed the Improving America's Schools Act, or IASA, which aimed to reform elementary and secondary education by boosting funding for bilingual and immigrant educations, allowing for public charter schools, and taking strides toward preventing drop outs and incorporating education technology into the classroom.

2001

Another take on improving schooling with President G.W. Bush's signing of the No Child Left Behind Act, which implemented some serious student testing and penalized schools that didn't hit student achievement quotas. Does this help out in schools or make it harder to test out? The controversy continues.

2008

Shmoop is founded. Booya.

2009

President Barack Obama announced Race To The Top, a grant to incentivize innovation and reform in K-12 education. This was another in a series of reforms to try to improve teaching and learning patterns in the U.S. Maybe not quite as cool as Michelle's initiative to get kids breakin' it down like Beyoncé, but hey, it's all about putting some groove into education.

2012

The Sandy Hook Shooting, in which Adam Lanza killed 20 children and 6 adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School, was the second deadliest mass shooting by a single person in U.S. history. Along with shootings at Columbine and Virginia Tech, this event was part of a growing and very scary trend of school shootings.

2014

Minnesota became the 33rd state to create a formal transgender student policy as the Minnesota State High School League voted to allow transgender students to participate on female sports teams. That'll keep the liberals happy for a minute or two.

2015

Ever since the recession of 2008, budget cuts were hitting schools pretty durn hard. President Obama said that national schools needed a bigger chunk of federal money since "this is a monumental task and it requires resources."

A lot of these debates are still getting people's hackles up today. Whether it's evolution, race, gender, or just how many dolla-bills the education system should get each year, the history of education is as much about bitter partisan battles as learning to read. But if you're reading this now, at least it did something right.