The History of Education / Educational Practice and Progress Considered as a Phase of the Development and Spread of Western Civilization

by Ellwood Patterson Cubberley

I. SPREAD OF THE STATE-CONTROL IDEA

THE FIVE TYPE NATIONS. We have now traced, in some detail, the struggles of forward-looking men to establish national systems of education in five great world nations. In each we have described the steps by means of which the State gradually superseded the Church in the control of education, and the motives and impulses which finally led the State to take over the school as a function of the State. The steps and impelling motives and rate of transfer were not the same in any two nations, but in each of the five the political necessities of the State in time made the transfer seem desirable. Time everywhere was required to effect the change. The movement began earliest and was concluded earliest in the German States, and was concluded last in England. In the German States, France, and Italy the change came rapidly and as a result of legislative acts or imperial decrees. In England and the United States the transfer took place, as we have seen, only in response to the slow development of public opinion.

This change in control and extension of educational advantages was essentially a nineteenth-century movement, and a resultant of the new political philosophy and the democratic revolutions of the later eighteenth century, combined with the industrial revolution of the nineteenth century. A new political impulse now replaced the earlier religious motive as the incentive for education, and education for literacy and citizenship became, during the nineteenth century, a new political ideal that has, in time, spread to progressive nations all over the world.

The five great nations whose educational evolution has been described in the preceding chapters may be regarded as having formed types which have since been copied, in more or less detail, by the more progressive nations in different parts of the world. The continental European two-class school system, the American educational ladder, and the English tendency to combine the two and use the best parts of each, have been reproduced in the different national educational systems which have been created by the various political governments of the world. The continental European idea of a centralized ministry for education, with an appointed head or a cabinet minister in control, has also been widely copied. The Prussian two-class plan has been most influential among the Teutonic and Slavic peoples of Europe, and has also deeply influenced educational development among the Japanese; English ideas have been extensively copied in the English self-governing dominions; and the American plan has been clearly influential in Canada, the Argentine, and in China. The French centralized plan for organization and administration has been widely copied in the state educational organizations of the Latin nations of Europe and South America. In a general way it may be stated that the more democratic the government of a nation has become the greater has been the tendency to break away from the two-class school system, to introduce more of an educational ladder, and to bring in more of the English conception of granting to localities a reasonable amount of local liberty in educational affairs.

SPREAD OF THE STATE CONTROL IDEA AMONG NORTHERN NATIONS. The development of schools under the control of the government, and the extension of state supervision to the existing religious schools, took place in the different cantons of Switzerland, and in Holland, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, somewhat contemporaneously with the development described for the five type nations. The work of Pestalozzi and Fellenberg, and of their disciples and followers, had given an early impetus to the establishment of schools and teacher-training in the Swiss cantons, most being done in the German-speaking portions.

In Holland, where the Reformation zeal for schools largely died out in the eighteenth century, the organization of the "Society of Public Good," in 1784, by a Mennonite clergyman, did much to awaken a new interest in schools for the people and to inaugurate a new movement for educational organization. In 1795 a revolution took place in Holland, a republic was established, and the extension of educational advantages followed. From 1806 to 1815 Holland was under the rule of Napoleon. A school law of 1806 forms the basis of public education in Holland. This asserted the supremacy of the State in education, and provided for state inspection of schools. In 1812 the French scientist, M. Cuvier, reported to Napoleon that there were 4451 schools in little Holland, and that one tenth of the total population was in school. In 1816 a normal school was established at Haarlem. Both the constitutions of 1815 and 1848 provided for state control of education, which has been steadily extended since the beginning of the revival in 1784. Today Holland provides a good system of public instruction for its people.

[Illustration: Fig. 210. THE SCHOOL SYSTEM OF DENMARK]

In Denmark and Sweden the development of state schools has been worked out, much as in England, in coöperation with the Church, and the Church still assists the State in the administration and supervision of the school systems which were eventually evolved. In each of these countries, too, the continental two-class school system has been somewhat modified by an upward movement of the transfer point between the two and the development of people's high schools, so as to produce a more democratic type of school and afford better educational opportunities to all classes of the population. The annexed diagram, showing the organization of education in Denmark, is typical of this modification and extension.

Finland should also be classed with these northern nations in matters of educational development. Lutheran ideas as to religion and the need for education took deep hold there at an early date (p. 297). A knowledge of reading and the Catechism was made necessary for confirmation as early as 1686, and democratic ideas also found an early home among this people. In consequence the Finns have for long been a literate people. The law making elementary education a function of the State, however, dates only from 1866, and secondary education was taken over from the ecclesiastical authorities only in 1872.

Similarly, Scotland, another northern nation, began schools as a phase of its Reformation fervor. During the eighteenth century the parish schools, created by the Acts of 1646 (R. 179; p. 335) and 1696, proved insufficient, and voluntary schools were added to supplement them. Together these insured for Scotland a much higher degree of literacy than was the case in England. The final state organization of education in Scotland dates from the Scottish Education Act of 1872.