EDLPS 531: History of Higher Education

EDLPS 531: History of Higher Education

Fall 2009

112 Miller Hall

Wednesdays, 4:30-6:50

Joy Williamson-Lott

Office: 315E Miller; 685-7749

(this is the best way to reach me)

Office hours: by appointment

Course website:

Course Description:

This course offers a survey of pivotal points in American higher educational history. We will begin our study in the Colonial Era and work our way up to the present. During its almost 400 years in the United States, higher education evolved from small, elitist institutions with a narrow purpose into large, multidimensional institutions with a more democratic purpose. This shift occurred gradually and was not always easy to achieve. Rather, changes in higher education (including decisions regarding who should attend, what should be taught, and what the purpose of higher education should be) only came after angry debate and controversy in which both sides sought to protect their own interests and vision for higher education. We will use this contentious history to fuel the class. First, we will examine the development of higher education from several (sometimes competing) perspectives including those of the student body, administrators, and faculty. Also, the readings are organized around some of the major debates in higher education including the fights over access, curriculum, governance, academic freedom, institutional organization, and the relationship of higher education to the general public.

The course uses primary sources and secondary sources. Primary sources (newspaper articles, speeches, autobiographies) allow the historical actors to speak for themselves and allow you, the reader, to draw your own conclusions about the material. Secondary sources (books and articles on a topic) help us identify the problems and opportunities in educational history as other writers have seen them. Both the primary and secondary sources offer competing perspectives on educational history and will complicate our understanding of what was “best” for higher education.

Logistically, each class will begin with a lecture on American history and educational history to provide a context for the readings. The second half will use whole group discussions, video, small group work, etc., to engage the material. Therefore, your ideas, perspectives, and thoughts are very important to the class.

Required Readings:

There is one book required for this class: John Thelin, A History of American Higher Education.

All other readings are on the course website at the address above.

Evaluation:

• Reaction Papers, 30% of credit(not graded)
• Book Club Assignment
• Meeting notes, 20% of credit (as a group; not graded)
• Presentation, 25% of credit (as a group; graded)
• Book review, 25% of credit (as an individual; graded; Due December 16)

Response papers,30% of credit (15% each):

Each student will write TWOresponses to the readings during the quarter that are 2-3 double-spaced pages in length. You may write your responses at any time during the quarter but must submit a total of two on two separate days. These will not be graded, but you should take the assignment seriously since they are what we will use to inform our class discussions. Your responses may reflect what you learned (or did not learn) from a particular source, what you found interesting and convincing (or the opposite), or how it extended (or failed to extend) your knowledge and understanding of significant issues in educational history. The hope is that you will demonstrate that you have read thoughtfully and considered seriously the merits of the ideas, perspectives, information, and proposals you have read. Try to avoid the detailed recounting of the readings as well as the simple assertion of opinions. Submit them via the course website in the folder marked “response papers.” Be sure to save your paper with your last name and response paper number. For instance, my first paper would be titled Williamson-Lott1.

If you are absent, you are required to write an extra response paper for that day’s readings. Email it directly to me.

Book Club Assignment: 70% of credit:

Your final assignment for the course is a book club project. At the beginning of the quarter, you will be divided into groups to discuss and analyze books relevant to the course material. The assignment is broken into three parts:

1. Meetings/Notes from Meetings, 20% of credit (group grade; not graded):

Your book club must meet at least four times duringthe quarter for approximately 1.5 hours each (not including the time it takes for your group to prepare the final presentation). This is your opportunity to digest the book as a group. During the meeting, you will adopt specific roles to help the discussion move along and to ensure wide participation. Roles include:

Organizer: This individual is responsible for scheduling the four meetings and finding a location to meet. He or she is also responsible for deciding with the group how many chapters or pages will be read prior to each meeting. In addition, this person will email a two to three sentence description to me of when and where your book club will be meeting.

Discussion Director: (This role should rotate for each meeting) As the Discussion Director, it is your job to write down some good questions that you think your group would want to talk about. List a minimum of five thought provoking questions. It is your job to get the conversation going.

Moderator: (This role should rotate for each meeting) You are responsible for keeping the discussion on track and ensuring that everyone in your group has an opportunity to participate in the discussion.

Text Luminary: (This role should rotate for each meeting) As the Luminary, it is your job to read aloud parts of the text to your group in order to help your group members remember some interesting, powerful, puzzling, or important sections of the book. You decide which passages or paragraphs are worth reading aloud, and justify your reasons for selecting them. Choose at least a minimum of 3 passages.

Connector: (This role should rotate for each meeting). As the connector, you find connections between this book and the chapters/articles/primary sources we have read and discussions we have had in class. You also encourage others in your group to connect this book with the course discussions and articles.

Summarizer: (This role should rotate for each meeting). As the summarizer, you are responsible for writing a brief two-page summary of the group’s discussion. This might include major ideas, disagreements, or questions considered by the group as well as how the group thought this section of the book connected to ideas and chapters/articles/sources we have discussed in class. Submit them via the course website in the folder marked “meeting notes.” When turning in summaries, title them with the name of your book club and the number of the meeting. In the text of the summary, be sure to include the name of your book club, names of all of its members, date of the meeting, and the specific pages discussed at a particular meeting. These should be submitted within one-week of the meeting.

2. Presentation, 25% of credit (group grade; graded):

Each book club is required to present their book to the whole class on the last day of class. Each group will have approximately 15 minutes to present and 5 minutes to respond to questions. Below are some general guidelines. However, be creative with your presentations—power point presentations, dramas, role plays, artwork, etc., are all possible ways of presenting your book to the whole group.

Regardless of the presentation form, your group should:

• Make sure that everyone in the group participates in the development of the presentation as well as the presentation itself
• Provide an overview of the big ideas in the book
• Connect themes and ideas from the book with themes we have discussed in class
• Highlight areas of common understanding within your group about the book as well as areas of disagreement

3. Book Review, 25% of credit (individual grade; graded):

A book review is a description, critical analysis, and evaluation on the quality, meaning, and significance of a book, not a retelling of summary of it. A good review should leave the reader with a succinct idea of the book’s topic/themes and a convincing and scholarlystatement of your own views of it.It should include a statement of what the author has tried to do, evaluation of how well the author has succeeded, and presentation of evidence to support this evaluation. This assignment should be no more than five double-spaced pages. I have uploaded a few book reviews I have done in the past, and it might be helpful to read some of the book reviews included in the History of Education Quarterly (Submit it in the folder marked “book review” on the course website. Title it with your last name and the words “book review.” Mine would be Williamson-Lott book review.

Your book review must include:

• Full citation of the book
• Brief summary of the book including its major themes
• Critical analysis of the book (evaluate the quality, significance, strengths/weaknesses, and usefulness of the book as well as your opinion of it; use your knowledge from inside and outside of class to inform your evaluation)
• Connections to articles/chapters/topics discussed in class (for instance, did it substantiate, challenge, deepen, or broaden what you learned from other authors or class discussions?)

Books from which you can choose (and I suggest you order them from your preferred bookseller IMMEDIATELY):

1. Linda Eisenmann, Higher Education For Women in Postwar America, 1945-1965(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006).
2. Jerome Karabel, The Chosen: The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2005).
3. Steven Brint and Jerome Karabel, The Diverted Dream: Community Colleges and the Promise of Educational Opportunity in America, 1900-1985 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989).
4. Peter Wallenstein, ed., Higher Education and the Civil Rights Movement: White Supremacy, Black Southerners, and College Campuses (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2008).
5. William Billingsley, Communists on Campus: Race, Politics, and the Public University in Sixties North Carolina (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1999).
6. Ellen Schrecker, No Ivory Tower: McCarthyism and the Universities (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986).
7. Helen Lefkowitz Horowitz, Campus Life: Undergraduate Cultures from the End of the Eighteenth Century to the Present (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987).
8. If you do not see a book of interest, you are free to select one yourself as long as you can recruit other students to join your group. It MUST be focused on history and be OK’ed by me. Also, you are welcome to choose a minimum of SEVEN articles on the same genre and consider them a book. You will still be required to fulfill all the requirements of the typical book club assignment.

Course Calendar

September

30Introduction

October

7The construction of a distinctly American higher education: Colonial and Revolutionary Era colleges

Thelin, A History of American Higher Education, chapters 1 and 2

Wright, “For the Children of the Infidels”

Kerber, “Why Should Girls be Learnd or Wise?”

Primary sources: Harvard University Statues and Charter, 1646 and 1650; Jefferson, “The Natural Aristocracy among Men”

14Antebellum and post-bellum eras: Gender, race and the curriculum

Thelin, A History of American Higher Education, chapter 3

Solomon, “The Utility of their Educations”

Anderson, “Training the Apostles of Liberal Culture”

Primary sources: Willard, “The Education of Women;” Yale Report; DuBois, “Diuturni Silenti”

21A visit to the UW Archives

28Differences in college students’ experiences in the early 20thcentury

Thelin, A History of American Higher Education, chapter 5

Horowitz, “Jacobins and Other Rebels”

Perkins, “The African American Female Elite”

Primary sources: Maurice Fishberg, “Assimilation;” Hurwitz, “A Memorandum on Menorah Education”

November

4Before and after: Community/junior colleges and graduate/professional schools

Thelin, A History of American Higher Education, chapter 6

Brint and Karabel, “Community Colleges and the American Social Order” and “The Take-Off Period”

Labaree, “Teacher Ed in the Past”

Primary source: 1947 President’s Commission on Higher Education

11Veteran’s Day (no class)

18The Cold War and the college campus

Sanders, “The Politics of Loyalty: The Canwell Committee Hearings and the University of Washington”

James, “‘Life Begins with Freedom’: The College Nisei, 1942-1945”

Primary sources: AAUP, “1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure”

25Day before Thanksgiving (no class)

December

2The 1960s and student activism

Thelin, A History of American Higher Education, chapter 7

Astin, “Overview of the Unrest Era”

Rosenthal, “Southern Black Student Activism”

Klatch, “The New Age”

Primary sources: Chicano Coordinating Council, “El Plan de Santa Barbara;” Rafferty, “Campus Violence: A Fascist Conspiracy;” Mario Savio, “An End to History;”Clark Kerr on the Responsibilities of the University during the Civil Rights Era

9Recent trends and issues in American higher education: the canon and affirmative action

Thelin, A History of American Higher Education, chapter 8

D’Souza, “Travels with Rigoberta”

Graff, “The Vanishing Classics and Other Myths,” and “When is Something ‘Political’”

Primary Sources: Proposition 209; Gratz v. Bollingersyllabus and dissent; Grutter v. Bollingersyllabus and dissent

16Group presentations

BOOK REVIEW DUE: December 16

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 I have Morva McDonald to thank for this assignment.