The poem and photographic collage is the work of students at the Pima Indian School boarding school near Phoenix, Arizona, and is part of an album probably owned by the school matron. The school was one of some 150 institutions for Indian wards of… [more]

Howard High School, the only free high school for African Americans in Delaware until the 1950s, was built shortly after the Civil War. In this clip, interviewees describe the obstacles former students faced, such as traveling long distances each day… [more]

The only high school for African Americans in Delaware, Howard High School's original small, five-room building, was built shortly after the Civil War. In the early 1870s, Edwina B. Kruse became the first African American principal of the school. She… [more]

In 1954, the Supreme Court declared the "separate but equal" doctrine unconstitutional in Brown vs. the Board of Education of Topeka. Years earlier, however, Pierre S. du Pont, President of E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co. and General Motors in the… [more]

In this painting of a kuttab, or primary school, boys sit on a mat or carpet huddled close together with their writing boards. Boys, and sometimes girls, learned to recite the Qur'an at an early age, as well as the basics of reading, writing, and… [more]

This public building of Mamluk Cairo in Egypt has two functions. Its lower level housed a sabil, or fountain, for dispensing water to thirsty travelers and denizens of the city, and its upper level was a public primary school for the teaching of… [more]

This essay was printed in the periodical Meiroku Zasshi in May 1874. The magazine was produced by a small group of intellectuals committed to the study of Europe and America. This journal, and the individuals who contributed to it, were at the core… [more]

While most pre-Meiji commoner schools were held either in temples or in the homes of the teachers, most teachers and officials associated with the Meiji education reforms emphasized the importance of having schools in new buildings created… [more]

This module employs primary sources from Japan to illustrate themes in the rise of modern education systems, such as the equation of “education” with "schooling", the impact of modern schooling upon the culture and social experience of childhood, the connection between education and the nation-state, and the influence of European imperialism upon schooling.

In early 19th-century Argentina, political leaders considered schools to be one of the nation's most important institutions of social control and politicization. The following is an 1817 handwriting assignment from a public elementary school in the… [more]