Summary Of Organizing The American School: The Nineteenth Century Schoolmarm

In “Organizing the American School: The Nineteenth Century Schoolmarm”, Joel Spring discusses how the common school reform, which took place during the middle of the nineteenth century, resulted in the creation of new forms of school organization. He then includes three steps that were needed for the common school to be actualized and how women were involved in factors dealing with the steps. The first step was to create a teaching force that was stable and inexpensive. Spring writes that the creation of this force began with the efforts of women educators, which lead to the establishment of teacher-training institutions. Their efforts were listened to since reformers of the common school believed women would be able to successfully provide moral education, similar to how women were already believed to have an impact on how their sons’ morality

City superintendents of urban areas would supervise and evaluate teachers and students in a classroom, taking over the role of a school committee. Organization is further controlled by the introduction of the new roles of a principal teacher and an assistant teacher, where a principal would have more administrative duties than teaching functions. The introduction of the principal and having superintendents created a hierarchal system, which Spring says, allowed a uniform educational system. Spring says, “An important factor in creating this hierarchical system was the subservient status of women” (Spring 113), women were expected to be nurturing and loving while men managed and guided holding authoritative positions. Once positions within the school system were created, curriculum and instruction needed to be uniform. McGuffey readers were introduced and used while common schools were developing; they contained lessons on morality that were designed to teach appropriate