So, for some reason, WordPress wouldn’t allow me to log-in for over a month – so I just gave up for a while. I randomly tried again today and I was able to log-in. Very strange.

Anyway, during the down-time, I was able to do some thinking about if I was ever able to log back in. I decided, if I was able to, I was going to make this blog a little more political. Thus far, I’ve only been focusing on education related subjects – and that’s felt fairly limiting. So, the focus is going to remain on participatory education, but the blog will also branch out to other subjects. I feel that will give the blog a lot more potential and will make me feel less restricted.

So, moral of the story, Adventures in Free Schooling is back. Here are some links I’m reading right now:

• Governments Across Europe Tremble as People Take To The Streets

Guardian: Effects of global recession on European economies provoke unrest from Budapest to Rejkavik.

• Gaza Desperately Short of Food After Israel Destroys Farmland
  

Guardian: Officials warn of ‘destruction of all means of life’ after the three-week conflict leaves agriculture in the region in ruins.

The New School in New York City is being occupied by over 100 students, demanding the resignation of their principal Bob Kerrey – former governor of and senator from Nebraska – who was an early supporter of the Iraq War. The students, those occupying the building and their supporters outside, are also calling for the resignation of the school’s Treasure, who is tied to Abu Gharib prison. This is following an overwhelming vote from the faculty of no confidence in the president and vice president of the University. Earlier today, the police attacked the school but the students resisted. I’ll keep it brisk here so you can follow the links below for more details and spread the word:

http://www.newschoolinexileblog.blogspot.com

http://www.newschoolinexileblog.blogspot.com

If you are in New York, show them your support! Here’s a link to a Daily Kos article explaining more on how to show support.

Hey there folks, I’m putting together a mini-curriculum on teaching workplace democracy, starting worker cooperatives, and so on. It is going to be based on critical pedagogy/popular education models, and it will be designed so that it uses the least amount of (and least expensive) resources available so that it can be replicated by as many people as possible. I’m also planning on eventually expanding this mini-curriculum into a full-fledged teaching guide.

So, I’m wondering if anyone out there has had any experience in teaching workplace democracy or about cooperatives/collectives? Would you be willing to either correspond with me about your experience, share resources, or make available your curriculum (or ones you know about)? I would love to not have to reinvent the wheel and see what other folks have done so I can get a sense of what to try.

If so, please either leave a comment or send me an e-mail at brian AT freeschooling DOT org. Thanks!

(Just FYI: the mini-curriculum will be completed no later than December 18th).

This is the second in our “History of Schools” Series. This is also an attempt that requires some editing.

Introduction

After the famous battle of the Little Big Horn in 1876, the surrender of Geronimo in 1886, and the massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890, the so-called “Indian Wars” came to an end (Adams, 1997), (Marshall III, 2007). According to historian Howard Zinn, these events solidified nearly four-hundred years of European and Euro-American conquest and genocide against the original inhabitants of the North American continent (Zinn, 2005). Many Native Americans now faced a harsh and unknown way of living. For them, the reservation system was a new and almost completely controlled existence. Lakota Indian historian Joseph M. Marshall III writes that a “loss of dignity came on the heels of [the] loss of freedom” (Marshall III, 2007, page 140). For the Lakota, living on vast plains became an extinguished reality, and instead they were reduced to miniscule agencies where they were trapped and confined (Marshall III, 2007). All the while, the United States government continued to take lands from the natives and attempted to destroy their cultures, societies, and identities. This was the process of assimilation.

One of the most powerful tools for cultural genocide that the United States had in its arsenal was the school. Both on reservation schools and boarding schools served assimilation goals by targeting native children and attempting to turn them into, what Euro-Americans identified as, “civilized.” The school that started this all was the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania, begun by Captain Richard Henry Pratt of the U.S. military. Supporters referred to this movement and its schools as a “noble experiment” to turn native children into mirrored images of the “white man.” This, they contested, was the only way that American Indians would be able to survive the “progress” of white expansion. They would either have to perish in its path or become assimilated into its borders (Adams, 1997).

This discussion will center on Carlisle and the role it played in founding the movement. We will also look in depth at both the history and philosophy of Pratt. Carlisle was his brainchild, and thus both the school itself and the movement it gave life to are intricately related to his actions and words. However, this dialogue will not center on a few topics that are sometimes discussed about Carlisle – including its football fame and celebrated athlete, Jim Thorpe. Instead, the intention here is to explore the use of education as a means of cultural destruction and replacement, and as a process of securing domination over American Indians. Nevertheless, as the Carlisle Indian Industrial School Research Pages expresses, “[i]t is our purpose to respectfully honor those students and their descendants who lived the experiment, to celebrate with those who prospered from it, and to grieve with those whose lives were diminished by it” (Landis, 1996). As we shall explore shortly, the legacy of Carlisle is a complex and intimidating one to comprehend. Yet, it is one we must attempt to familiarize ourselves with in order to understand the powerful role education has and can play as an instrument of oppression.

A School Born From a Prison

On May 21^st, 1875, a train pulled into St. Augustine, Florida. There had originally been seventy-two captured warriors on board, but one attempted suicide while another had been fatally shot while escaping. These warriors were American Indians, captured in what is known as the Red River War, and were now sent to serve an indefinite amount of time in prison for their convictions. Ft. Marion, a former Spanish fort turned into a prison, was in an environment unfamiliar and hostile to these American Indians. The prisoners – who were comprised of Comanche, Caddo, Southern Cheyenne, and Kiowa – were not prepared for the extremely hot and humid environment of Florida (Anderson, 2000), (Adams, 1997). Captain Richard Henry Pratt was assigned the task of overseeing the prison and its captors. His instructions were vague and detailed little about his responsibilities, but Pratt’s ambitions were large.

Pratt, born in 1840, began his military career by enlisting in the Union Army in 1861, just as the Civil War was getting underway. Afterwards, he served as a relatively young cavalry officer, commanding an African-American regiment of the infamous Buffalo soldiers, whom fought alongside American Indian scouts. Known as “Indian fighters,” they were used for the purpose of expanding the post-war borders of the United States further into Native American territory. Throughout this time, Pratt interacted constantly with American Indian scouts, Native Americans that opposed the United States, and those that had been forced onto the agencies (later known as reservations) (Atleo, 2008). During this time, Pratt came to the conclusion that the only solution for the indigenous peoples – to protect them from complete annihilation as a result of the “progress” of white expansion – would be to assimilate them into “white society.” Pratt had been convinced by the “humanitarian gentlemen” philosophy that native people should not be exterminated, but that they should instead be siphoned off into the advancement of white society (Adams, 1997).

Pratt was a determined and ambitious army officer, and he was not the type to sit idly by. His assignment at Ft. Marion, which he had requested, gave him the opportunity to implement the philosophies he had developed. Moving swiftly, Pratt ordered for the captives to have their hair cut off, dressed them in military uniforms, organized them into systems of hierarchy that mirrored his military experience, forced them to learn English, and more (Atleo, 2008). Soon, teachers poured into the prison from the surrounding community of St. Augustine (Adams, 1997). Most were local women who volunteered their time, but some also traded their involvement for such things as archery lessons (Landis, 1996). In large part, these women were the foot soldiers in the assimilation process at Ft. Marion. They lectured the prisoners on various subjects ranging from the English language, to Christianity, and all other factors that formed the “white man’s civilization.” Every evening, Pratt met with the captured natives and lectured them on what they needed to do in order to survive: the adoption of white society. Both physically and mentally traumatized by their prison experience, some captives began to listen. Pratt thus happily played the role of the benevolent father, lifting his children from “savagery.” Pratt’s dream, to transform the “prison into a school for teaching civilization to the Indians” (Adams, 1997, page 39), was being realized. The Ft. Marion program continued to expand, contracting labor for the prisoners, teaching them how to save money, and sending them out into the town of St. Augustine to work jobs and spend their money. This concept of putting his prisoners into the community as a form of assimilation and visibility stuck with Pratt (Adams, 1997).

St. Augustine was also the vacation spot of choice for many New Englanders, and a large number of these came to inspect Pratt’s strange experiment. As a direct result, Pratt made contact with a substantial donor and benefactor base. The majority of these potential backers were Quakers or reformers who were uncomfortable with extermination policies, and who had already been intensively discussing the prospect of an alternative. Pratt’s methods greatly appealed to them. These potential benefactors had become concerned for the welfare of the natives who were “beginning to resemble white men” (Landis, 1996).

While factually incorrect, most white residents of the United States believed that the “primitive” American Indian societies entirely lacked (or had only undeveloped resemblances of) any structures of “civilization.” This included organized religion, codes of law, forms of governance, and any form of education. However, there were different explanations for this belief: some argued that it was a result of racial inferiority, while others contested that it was a consequence of cultural and historical circumstances. Pratt belonged to the latter group, known as reformers, and he argued feverishly that Native Americans could be good “American citizens” if they were only provided equal access to education and vocational opportunities (Lomawaima & Teresa, 2006).

Pratt was also known for his famous slogan “kill the Indian, save the man.” This slogan was based off his intense passion to witness the transformation of natives into a replication of the white society in the United States. As Pratt would later write in a letter to a magazine,

It is this nature in our red brother that is better dead than alive, and when we agree with the oft-repeated sentiment that the only good Indian is a dead one, we mean this characteristic of the Indian. Carlisle’s mission is to kill THIS Indian, as we build up the better man. We give the rising Indian something nobler and higher to think about and do, and he comes out a young man with the ambitions and aspirations of his more favored white brother.

(Landis, 1996)

Eventually Pratt convinced the federal government that his methods had worked so well that any further incarceration of the Native Americans would do no good, and they were released. However, Pratt was also able to convince seventeen of his prisoners to seek out further education – and after considerable effort, he persuaded the Hampton Institute to accept them. Hampton was a controversial school for African-Americans that focused on making “racial progress” under the “benevolent tutelage” of whites. At this institute, African-Americans worked on manual training and also training for “cultural uplift.” At Hampton, Pratt served as the director of the American Indian students, and the ideals and structure of the school greatly solidified his philosophy on education for American Indian assimilation. However, Pratt had larger aspirations and was not fond of being anything other than in charge. After lobbying for financial support from funders and the government, Pratt was ready to start a school – based off of the models of the prison and the Hampton Institute. Pratt, however, realized that in order to efficiently assimilate natives, he would have to begin when they were younger. Those who had witnessed or heard about his success at Ft. Marion were only too happy to oblige his calls for support. After a short investigation of where to house his new school, Pratt chose – appropriately enough – a former military barracks in the countryside of Carlisle, Pennsylvania. What is important to recognize here is that the school Pratt was about to begin became the example that was replicated all across the country in an effort to mass assimilate the Native American peoples. For 25 years, Pratt remained the headmaster of the school he founded in Carlisle, and his opinions and actions drastically shaped the relationships between American Indians, whites, and the United States (Adams, 1997).

The Leaders, the Parents, and the Students

Before the new school could be opened, it required students. Pratt, who had spent much of his time with the Buffalo Soldiers, returned to the west to recruit native children. His first targets were two Lakota reservations: Pine Ridge and Rosebud (in what is now South Dakota). Meanwhile, two of his pupils from Ft. Marion and Hampton traveled southwest to recruit Kiowa and Cheyenne (Anderson, 2000).

Two notable parents and chiefs that allowed for several of their children and grandchildren to be taken to Carlisle, and who advocated for others to do the same, were Spotted Tail of the Sicangu Lakota and Red Cloud of the Oglala Lakota. Spotted Tail had long contested that the continued incursion of whites was inevitable, and that the Lakota people would have to drastically change their ways in order to survive (Marshall III, 2007). Pratt convinced Spotted Tail, Red Cloud, and some of their followers to send their children to Carlisle by arguing that if their people had understood English, they could have prevented white encroachment and held the United States to the treaties it signed – or at least understood what was ultimately to come. Although Spotted Tail and Red Cloud were not entirely convinced that Pratt’s intentions were of good faith, they believed that white encroachment would not end (Anderson, 2000). Luther Standing Bear, son of Spotted Tail and a famous Native American writer, actor, and activist, agreed to go to Carlisle with Pratt. He, however, was not convinced that Pratt wanted to educate the children, and recalled the memory of the Captain’s visit to the reservation:

One day some white people came among us and called a meeting with the parents… They had come after some boys and girls and wanted to take them a long way off to a place about which we knew nothing. I consented at once, though I could think of nothing else but that these white people wanted to take us far away and kill us… To me it meant death, but bravery was part of my blood, so I did not hesitate.

(Lomawaima & Teresa, 2006, page 16)

The first students arrived at Carlisle in 1879, three years after the Battle of Little Bighorn. Eighty-two children, mostly Lakota, pulled into town in a train late at night. Throngs of towns-folk craned their necks to get a better glimpse of these “exotic” and “wild” children. From this point on, American Indian children would be a familiar site in Carlisle. For 39 years, 1879 to 1918, approximately 12,000 native children were sent to Carlisle – some by choice, others by force. While some survived, others did not. The children who attended Carlisle came from every section of the United States and its empire, some as far as Puerto Rico and the Philippines. However, the vast majority of the children who were sent to Carlisle came from one of the 140 American Indian tribes or nations that’s children populated the school (Anderson, 2000).

Pratt had a long running feud with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and on the night of the first students’ arrival, he discovered that the Bureau had thwarted him: it had failed to send any food, bedding, or any other provisions. The native children were forced to sleep on the hard floor while cold and hungry, with nothing more than the personal blankets they might have brought with them. However, the next morning, Pratt left right away to collect the Cheyenne and Kiowa children. Meanwhile, Mrs. Pratt and the other teachers took over the operation (Anderson, 2000). On this first day, the native children were forced to sit in the barbershop, for what Joseph M. Marshall III called the “first lesson about their new identity” (Marshall III, 2007). Every young male’s hair was chopped off. As with many American Indian cultures, and especially for the Lakota, hair was a vitally important aspect to one’s identity. To cut this off was to instantly redefine them. The new arrivals were confused, isolated, and homesick; and they cried as their hair was cut and fell to the ground (Anderson, 2000). As Sterling Hollow Horn, a Lakota of Pine Ridge said:

In our culture, the only time we cut hair is when we are in mourning or when someone has died in the immediate family. We do this to show we are mourning the loss of a loved one.

(Anderson, 2000)

This act of chopping off the children’s hair was the first step of many in Carlisle’s overall goal of total assimilation; and the assimilation’s purpose was to destroy native culture by preventing its development and expansion in the children (Marshall III, 2007). This process served as a two-pronged attack on the native children: to tear away their identity and physical relation to native life, and then to restructure it with an identity that mirrored “civilized” life (Adams, 1997). This method was promoted by the belief of many whites that the indigenous peoples faced no other alternative than to become, essentially, white – or face annihilation. As Judge Elmer Dundy wrote in his 1879 decision in Standing Bear v. Crook:

On one side we have the remnants of a once numerous and powerful, but now weak, insignificant, unlettered, and generally despised race. On the other, we have the representatives of one of the most powerful, most enlightened, and most Christianized nations of modern times…

(Marshall III, 2007, page 145)

Spotted Tail, however, had an alternative take on the issue. He realized that times had changed, and that the rules of survival were now different. Spotted Tail and Red Cloud had witnessed the cities of the United States and had seen the masses that populated them. They were both awed by the sheer numbers of people. Ultimately, they wanted survival for the Lakota children, and they believed that the education that was promised to their people by Pratt would make it eventually easier to live in this new world. It was necessary, Spotted Tail argued, to adjust to a new lifestyle. Nevertheless, neither of them believed that this would require their children to have their core identities obliterated. “To both of them,” Marshall III wrote, “living like whites did not mean becoming whites” (Marshall III, 2007, page 145).

This is why, while on a trip to Carlisle, Spotted Tail became enraged by what he witnessed and by the methodology of the institution. He had not anticipated the destruction of the Lakota identity: the cutting off of hair for boys, the forced military uniforms, the tight shoes that replaced the moccasins; or how the children were made to stand and march in line as if they were a military regiment, and the physical punishment for speaking their native language (Marshall III, 2007). Spotted Tail took his children, grandchildren, and other family members home over the objections of Pratt. The family left under the armed guard of the other American Indians who had accompanied Spotted Tail on the trip (Atleo, 2008). Thousands of others, however, would have to endure the fate of years away from their families under the strict and regimented lifestyles enforced by the school – as the “[administrators], teachers, and dormitory matrons carried out the policy and the process of assimilation with impunity” (Marshall III, 2007, page 144).

While the reservation system was a process of containment, the boarding school movement – inspired by the Carlisle Indian Industrial School – was a method of assimilating the contained peoples. Pratt, however, was unhappy with the reservation system itself, believing that it would do more harm than good. The so-called “Indian problem” could only be solved, he alleged, through active and aggressive assimilation measures and policies (Anderson, 2000). In 1890, Pratt wrote to the commissioner of Indian Affairs:

If millions of black savages can become so transformed and assimilated, and if, annually, hundreds of thousands of emigrants from all lands can also become Anglicized, Americanized, assimilated and absorbed through association, there is but one plain duty resting upon us with regard to the Indians, and that is to relieve them of their savagery and other alien qualities by the same methods used to relieve the others.

(Anderson, 2000)

Assimilation also functioned as a way to deny differences amongst American Indians, to create homogeneity where there were differences, and to label them all as “uncivilized” and “savages.” Barbara Landis, a Carlisle Indian School biographer, writes, “[t]here were kids who were Lakota, and there were kids who were Wampanoag. At Carlisle, they became Indian” (Anderson, 2000). Stephanie Anderson, author of “On Sacred Ground,” emphasizes this point:

The erosion of Native-American sovereignty was swift and unrelenting. Propelled by a hunger for land, gold, power and control, it swallowed up everything in its path, including communities, languages and religions. No matter the Nez Perce were distinct from the Navajo, the Seneca from the Seminole, the Coeur D’Alene from the Crow. They were one in their difference.

(Anderson, 2000)

Carlisle’s assimilation of Native Americans also served two other purposes: preparing Native people to surrender tribally controlled lands and accept individual land allotments, while also reading them to enter the lower positions of the domestic and manual labor markets. As we will see shortly, the training at Carlisle and the other boarding schools prevented the native children from directly competing economically with the higher ranks of the United States workforce. Post-Carlisle jobs were extremely limited. This was often protested by Native Americans, but policy-makers ignored or didn’t take their concerns too seriously. In fact, American Indians were not even allowed to become teachers for members of their own tribes – out of the fear that such a possibility was too dangerous. The laundry room was a much safer job for them to have than the classroom (Lomawaima & Teresa, 2006). One alternative job prospect, however, was to get involved with one of the many churches. Carlisle received a large portion of its finances from the U.S. government, but it realized that there was a large monetary burden in order to “civilize” so many native children. Churches were more than happy to fill this void and to answer the temptation to convert so many souls to Christianity (Marshall III, 2007).

Funds also poured in from some other sources, including the Quaker reformers, Christian Missionaries (Marshall III, 2007), former abolitionists, and Pratt’s supporters from the early days of Ft. Marion. One such tool for fundraising was subscriptions to Carlisle’s newspaper, the Red Man, which was also an avenue for Pratt to espouse his arguments and views. One notable early supporter of Pratt’s was none-other than Senator Henry Dawes, author of the General Allotment Act – which resulted in the loss of over 40% of remaining tribal lands. Senator Dawes considered Pratt’s school, strategy of education, and methods of assimilation as strong compliments to his allotment approach, and he believed the two methods would come together to form a general solution for the “Indian problem” (Landis, 1996).

On September 30^th, 1896, the United States government, in a decision known as the Browning Ruling, declared that Native American parents did not have the right to decide if their children would go to school – or even where they would attend school. This decision was a continuation of the racist belief that Native American parents were themselves mentally and physically almost the same as children, and thus children of the state (Lomawaima & Teresa, 2006).  The commissioner of Indian Affairs, Thomas Jefferson Morgan, described his favorite tactic for forcibly taking children or coercing their parents into letting their children go:

I would…use the Indian police if necessary. I would withhold from [the Indian adults] rations and supplies…and when every other means was exhausted…I would send a troop of United States soldiers, not to seize them, but simply to be present as an expression of the power of the government. Then I would say to these people, “Put your children in school; and they would do it.”

(Alteo, 2008)

Congress also authorized other methods of coercion and compulsion, including the use of “[w]ithholding rations, clothing, and other annuities from Indian parents or guardians who refuse or neglect to send and keep their children… in some school…” (Adams, 1997, page 64). However, some parents did find ways to avoid having their children be taken: one American Indian mother recalls a popular tactic of playing a game similar to hide and seek, so that their children would disappear for a time (Atleo, 2008).

The massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890, in which over three-hundred Lakota were killed by U.S. troops, only demonstrated just how far the U.S. government was willing to go in order to subjugate the indigenous peoples to its will (Marshall III, 2007). And by the late 1800’s, the off-reservation boarding schools had become regarded as the best tool and place for “Americanizing” natives (Lomawaima & Teresa, 2006). With Carlisle leading the way in methods and in its example, both reservation schools and boarding schools were making great efforts to “civilize” the indigenous peoples. “This,” Marshall III argues, “was simply a continuation of the colonialist mindset” (Marshall III, 2007, page 171). With all of this information in hand, we can see an attack on native peoples using three techniques: with boarding schools serving the purpose of constructing “productive” and “Americanized” citizens out of natives, missionaries and churches concerning themselves with their spirituality and religious devotions, and the U.S. government busy with their lands (Anderson, 2000).

The Classroom and Beyond

Once at Carlisle, the native students were continually reminded of the surveillance and scrutiny that they were kept under. At the school, Pratt was known infamously as “the man on the bandstand,” because of the circular bandstand that was located in the center of campus where his office was placed. This allowed him a view of the entire campus. As Stephanie Anderson points out,

But more than a pseudonym for Pratt, the constant reminder that “the man on the bandstand” was watching represented the all-encompassing, paternalistic way in which Pratt and the teachers, ministers and matrons viewed themselves as the “saviors” of the Indian children. The phrase was meant to make the children feel secure and cared for. It also reminded them that they were under constant surveillance.

(Anderson, 2000)

In fact, the entire identity of Carlisle was shaped and molded by Pratt’s military history. Boys were made to dress in military uniforms, while girls had to wear Victorian-style dresses. Students were given military-style ranks – and were thus made to march and to drill in military fashion (Anderson, 2000). In the school, (children) officers were in command over lesser-rank children, and a court system was organized in a hierarchal and strict structure that mirrored that of the military’s. Discipline was strictly enforced (Landis, 1996). In addition to this military influence, Pratt wanted his students to be trained in trades and academics. Thus, half of the children’s day was spent working while the other half was spent studying. Each day, one portion of the school would study while the other portion worked, and then the two would switch (Anderson, 2000).

Indigenous children were certainly taught the “three R’s,” as was the method of the common schools in the United States at the time. Yet, before this could be accomplished, students first had to be taught to not be themselves. This principle manifested itself in several ways. One particular example of this is that from the moment children arrived to Carlisle, English was their new – and only – language. In fact, their native languages were never to be spoken again (Marshall III, 2007). Pratt’s stated goal, in the drive for assimilation, was the destruction of all Native languages. This objective was feverishly and harshly sought after. If students were caught speaking their native language, even in private, they were certain to receive a callous punishment: the most notorious penalty was a severe beating. While this method did not always outright destroy the children’s use of native languages, many of them decided never to teach or speak their language to their children because of their experience at Carlisle (Anderson, 2000). Hollow Horn informs us about the lasting impact this cruel practice left:

They didn’t let [the students] speak in the old language… They set a dangerous precedent. I’m fluent in the Sioux language. Most people my age don’t speak the language. It’s dying out. The whole spirituality and way of thinking is intertwined with the language. That’s all being lost. Carlisle was the starting point for this.

(Anderson, 2000)

K.T. Lomawaima and L. M. Teresa, authors of To Remain an Indian, strengthen his point:

The causes of language loss are as complex as the history of colonization and are ultimately traceable to the policies of containment, dislocation, and genocide that characterized four centuries of Anglo European imperialism. Within this historical context, federal boarding schools…were instrumental in eradicating Indigenous languages. As Krauss points out, one does not simply “get over” the federally sanctioned abuse inflicted on children for speaking their tribal languages in school.

(Lomawaima & Teresa, 2006, page 135)

This statement extends through today, with the story of one Hualapi Native American who recalls that his father refused to teach him or his siblings their native language. This father constantly recalled the pain and hardships his friends went through as a result of knowing their own languages instead of English, and he didn’t want his children to have to endure the same pain (Lomawaima & Teresa, 2006). It is also important to understand that for many native children, learning the English language was not simply learning a new language – but instead, it was also the forced adoption of a completely new way of looking at the world (Adams, 1997).

Native children were also systematically renamed; their identities stripped from them and replaced with new, “white” ones. To understand the significance of such an act, one must understand the importance of names in many American Indian tribes, nations, and societies. One Native American author puts it into context:

Traditionally, Indian children did not have their names spoken often. When someone was referred to, it was usually either by relationship or by a nickname. But the children knew who they were: they belonged to the name, and the name belonged to them, and to no other. Naming and self-naming was a fluid, ongoing process which changed throughout a person’s life according to circumstance, personal experience, loss, triumph, foolishness, or social commentary. So a person could have (at least) a birth name, a baby name, several nicknames, a child name, a “young adult” name, an adult name, and an elder name. In addition, there might be a “secret” or ceremonial name, known only by the individual and the holy person who gave that name.

(Atleo, 2008)

Thus, the process of renaming students almost the instant they arrived at Carlisle was a significant part of the forced assimilation process. Luther Standing Bear recalled his experience, where on the first full day at Carlisle, the students were sat in front of a board with names on it and where given no explanation regarding their meanings. In front of them stood a teacher with a pointer, who instructed the children that they would now have to select a name (or that she would “help” them choose one). Once a name was chosen by the child, it was wiped from the board and written on a piece of long tape, which was then sewn to the back of the child’s shirt. The same author once again puts this act into context:

Once the children’s naming in this random way became enforced, they were denied the ability to express their life stories in name, an act of independent, autonomous identity central to Native ways of being in the world. It was a small, but important, step in “killing the Indian.”

(Alteo, 2008)

Yet, there were more tools in Pratt’s arsenal for assimilation and cultural genocide: song and theatre. Through portrayals of Native Americans in stereotypical forms, as “savages,” “uncivilized,” and so forth – Carlisle was able to brainwash many students into rejecting and hating their peoples and cultures. One such example comes in the form of the annual Thanksgiving play put on at the school, in which the native children dressed up as both Pilgrims and “Indians.” The students acted out the mythologized encounters between the two groups, and portrayed the stereotypes of American Indians. Through the course of both acting this out, and for the other students who witnessed the plays, they were led to accept these stereotypes of “savages” and the belief that American Indians were “bad.” They were also indoctrinated into the tale of the heroic Europeans, and the evil Native Americans (or the good ones that helped out the Europeans). One former student recalls the following:

They told us that Indian ways were bad. They said we must get civilized. I remember that word, too. It means ‘be like the white man.’ I am willing to be like the white man, but I did not believe Indian ways were wrong. But they kept teaching us for seven years. And the books told how bad the Indians had been to the white men-burning their towns and killing their women and children. But I had seen white men do that to Indians. We all wore white man’s clothes and ate white man’s food and went to white man’s churches and spoke white man’s talk. And so after a while we also began to say Indians were bad. We laughed at our own people and their blankets and cooking pots and sacred societies and dances…

(Atleo, 2008)

In fact, in 1892, at the direction of the Indian Office, the Native American boarding schools began to celebrate none other than Columbus Day. These celebrations were supposed to serve the purpose of instilling enthusiasm in the students and to develop in their minds a legacy for Columbus as a “beneficent development in their own race’s fortunes” (Adams, 1997). For the students at Carlisle, it was taken a step further. Native students were sent to both Chicago and New York to march in the gigantic Columbus Day celebrations and parades that marked the 400^th year anniversary of Columbus’s first landing in the Americas. Several prominent newspapers fawned at the displays, citing the children as examples of the success of Columbus’s “dream” of spreading Christianity and civilization to all of the “savages” (Adams, 1997).

Carlisle was so successful in its endeavors that schools (both on reservation and off) became the most effective tools for the government’s push for assimilation and absorption. In fact, even all on reservation schools were essentially imitations of Carlisle. The school’s accomplishments were seen as the best example for spreading mainstream education to thousands of indigenous children. There was, however, another side to this. As Marshall III explains:

But Carlisle’s success, of course, meant nothing less than confusion, humiliation, trauma, and heartache for the children who were touted as success stories. Most of them were not there of their own, or their parent’s, free will, and most were separated from their families and homes for years. While a few Lakota leaders and parents realized that a formal education would be necessary for their children to be able to survive and function within the new order, they could not have foreseen the hardships their children would have to endure. The cemetery for students who died while at Carlisle is mute testimony that many children, from several different tribes, were casualties of the process.”

(Marshall III, 2007, page 171)

Another example of Carlisle astounding ability to assimilate and forcibly transform children can be followed in one of its humanities classes and activities: drawing. When first arriving to Carlisle, student’s sketch books contained images they recalled from their previous life. Some of the earlier Lakota children, for instance, might draw buffalo hunts and warriors on horseback (although, of course, the Lakota were not representative of all American Indian cultures and societies that were present). In time, however, their drawings transformed into pictures depicting their new lives, which included farms, children with short hair, and European-style clothes (Anderson, 2000). The Outing system was another important aspect of Carlisle’s techniques, and it is said to have been Pratt’s favorite. Through outing, native children would spend anywhere from a summer to a year with a white family, generally in agricultural households. Pratt considered this a method of immersion, and the best and most effective way to make native children “white.” Children were not stationed in families near each other and were rarely near urban areas, out of the fear that this might strengthen their chances of successfully running away. While some children did enjoy the experience, there were also wide spread reports by others of abuse and contempt by the white families. When the outing system was replicated by other boarding schools, especially those that were further west, it was found that the native children were generally put into work gangs and used essentially as slave labor (Adams, 1997).

Over its 39 year lifespan, the initial 82 native children who went to Carlisle grew into almost 1,000 annually – with a total of 12,000 students by the time it closed its doors. In the end, most students returned to their reservations, while others became basic laborers, teachers, missionaries, and some worked in Indian Affair offices, while a few others joined Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Shows (which Pratt disapproved of). However, because of the school’s swell in size, it required more room. Students therefore built administrative buildings, a gymnasium, a chapel, and shops for different industrial training. They also had to build a cemetery (Landis, 1996).

The Cemetery and the Resistance

Little is known about who Lucy Pretty Eagle was. However, what is known is that she arrived in 1884 at Carlisle when she was ten years old, her name in Lakota was Take the Trail, and that she was the daughter of Pretty Eagle. We also know that the first gravestone in Carlisle’s cemetery belongs to her (Atleo, 2008). Today, over 180 tombstones populate the cemetery (Anderson, 2000). The very fact that the school had its own cemetery speaks volumes, but it should be understood that all the tombstones at Carlisle do not represent the amount of students who perished while at the school. These were simply the number of students who, for one reason or another, couldn’t be sent back home (Landis, 1996). It was reported that in 1881 alone, of the forty-nine students collected by Pratt three years earlier, ten had died. The death rate at Carlisle, and all of the boarding schools that it inspired, was alarming (Adams, 1997).

Some of the children died from running away, some died from diseases, while others died of climate change, separation anxiety, lack of immunity, physical abuse, and more. Those who succumbed to tuberculosis were buried right away, out of a fear of contamination (Atleo, 2008). Both tuberculosis and small pox were two of the more common and deadlier diseases amongst students, especially after they had contact with Euro-Americans (Landis, 1996). On top of this, while children were beaten for not understanding English, native children were also punished for a host of other reasons, including: slight infractions of military rule, for attempting to run away, for speaking their own languages, and also sometimes for grieving. This led to the death of many children as a result of abuse, malnutrition, illness, and other imposed social anxieties (Atleo, 2008).

Running away was a universal and not uncommon trend across Carlisle and other native boarding schools (Atleo, 2008). These children preferred to take their chances in the surrounding unknown, rather than enduring the brutalities they were made to face at the school (Anderson, 2000). It is remarkable to think that such a large number of students ran away rather than accepting their captivity, as this is a task that required extreme courage with the knowledge of what penalties awaited them if they were caught – and the lack of knowledge of the surroundings they were about to enter. For those who did not successfully run away or die trying, a special building awaited them at Carlisle. While it was originally constructed in 1777 as a place for gunpowder storage, it served as a sort of prison for the school: children were locked up in one of the four cells for up to a week for a variety of indiscretions, including the act of running away (Anderson, 2000).

It is necessary to also realize that the exact “success” of Carlisle’s assimilation efforts, according to Pratt and his supporters, should be put into perspective of the resounding rejection it received from the native students. David Wallace Adams, author of Education for Extinction, reports that the actual number of students completing Carlisle’s program was outstandingly low. Pratt was not able to present the first fourteen diplomas to students for completing Carlisle’s grammar school program until 1889 – ten years after the first students arrived! By the year 1899, roughly 3,800 native children were students of Carlisle. Of these, only 209 graduated (Adams, 1997). In fact, of the roughly 12,000 students that attended the school, a total of only 758 graduated. This is less than ten percent. More students actually ran away than graduated; there are an entire 1,758 reported cases of runaways. However, students also found other ways to resist and rebel. Much of this resistance manifested itself within intellectual, physical, or spiritual forms (Atleo, 2008). Children also tried to burn down Carlisle buildings, including two girls who attempted to burn down the same building twice in one day (Adams, 1997). Others refused to speak English, and there were more who undermined the matrons’ and teachers’ wills in any way that they could (Atleo, 2008). So, while not every student ran away, the vast majority of them found another way to reject Carlisle’s ultimate assimilation. However, as we will discuss now, the students’ rejection of the system should not be confused with their ability to go unscarred by it.

The End of Carlisle and the Remaining Legacy

Pratt eventually fell out of favor with the reformists and made enough enemies at the Bureau of Indian Affairs that he was fired, and only a couple of years later, Carlisle closed its doors in 1918. With Pratt gone, the school lost its appeal to many remaining funders, and the new headmaster entrenched the school in a series of scandals. The school, which had for so long been a flagship for the reformers and the assimilation efforts, became a burden and embarrassment to their aims, and it quietly shut down (Adams, 1997).

Of the over two million Native Americans that currently live in this country, the majority have some form of connection to Carlisle or the boarding school movement that it spawned. A great number of feelings surround this legacy, and many of these are internal-conflicts. Some do fully condemn the schools, while others cannot. It is, however, widely recognized that Carlisle’s practices of cultural genocide were ones rooted in the blatantly racist and paternalistic beliefs of the United States. As one Native American author argues,

The legacy of Carlisle and the other Indian boarding schools-this “future”-is a legacy of hopelessness and despair, of alcoholism and other substance abuse, suicide, dysfunctional parenting; an open, gaping century-long wound that will take many more years for the Indian communities all over the U.S. and Canada to heal.

(Atleo, 2008)

Today, it is easy to deem Pratt as a bigot. But roughly 100 years ago, he was considered a reformer amongst Euro-Americans. While Pratt wanted to “kill the Indian” to “save the man,” many Euro-Americans were unconcerned about the eventual survival of American Indians (Anderson, 2000). This does not excuse Pratt’s actions nor make him a hero, but instead remind us about the history of racism and the genocidal beliefs that are entrenched in United States history. We have also seen here how schools were used to further the oppression and cultural extinction of entire peoples. This movement, sprung to life by Pratt, used schools as the ultimate weapons for the dominance and subordination of Native Americans. Luther Standing Bear, who wrote intensively on the topic of Carlisle, can serve as an excellent reminder of the internal struggle that this external war forced upon native children:

Outwardly I lived the life of the white man, yet all the while I kept in direct contact with tribal life. While I had learned all that I could of the white man’s culture, I never forgot that of my people. I kept the language, tribal manners and usages, sang the songs and danced the dances. I still listened to and respected the advice of the older people of the tribe.

(Lomawaima & Teresa, 2006, page 40)

However, he would not admit defeat, and stated defiantly:

So if I today had a young mind to direct, to star on the journey of life, and I was faced with the duty of choosing between the natural way of my forefathers and that of the white man’s present way of civilization, I would, for its welfare, unhesitatingly set that child’s feet in the path of my forefathers. I would raise him to be an Indian!

(Lomawaima & Teresa, 2006, Pages 41-42)

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Adams, David W. Education for Extinction: American Indians and the Boarding School Experience, 1875-1928. New York: University P of Kansas, 1997.

Anderson, Stephanie. “On Sacred Ground: Commemorating Survival and Loss at the Carlisle Indian School.” Words as Weapons. May, 2000.  <http://www.wordsasweapons.com/indianschool.htm>.

Atleo, Marlene. “Books to Avoid: My Heart Is On the Ground.” Oyate. Oyate. 7 Sept. 2008 <http://oyate.org/books-to-avoid/myheart.html>.

Landis, Barbara, ed. Carlisle Indian Industrial School Research Pages. 1996. <http://home.epix.net/~landis/index.html>.

Lomawaima, K. T., and L. M. Teresa. To Remain an Indian: Lessons in Democracy from a Century of Native American Education. New York: Teachers College P, Teachers College, Columbia University, 2006.

Marshall III, Joseph M. The Day the World Ended at Little Bighorn: A Lakota History. New York: Viking Adult, 2007.

Zinn, Howard. A People’s History of the United States : 1492 to Present. New York: HarperCollins, 2005.

(Please note that the following is a first attempt, and needs some editing. Also, I decided in this essay to examine the aspects of Mondragón’s education that bears respect. This is not a critical examination of the education of Mondragón in regards to what it needs to improve, although such a discussion would be a good, lengthy, and important one. Instead, this is an exploration of the aspects of Mondragón’s educational philosphies, techniques, and models that should be regarded as beneficial influences):

Knowledge is power.

Knowledge must be socialized so that power can be democratized.

After the socialization of culture, inevitably follows the socialization of wealth and even of power. We may say that this is the indispensable and prior condition for the democratization and socioeconomic progress of a people.

-Don José María Arizmendiarrieta, Reflections

Introduction

The above quote illustrates the unique tie that exists between workplace democracy and learning-place democracy. Don José María Arizmendiarrieta, the founder of the Mondragón cooperative movement, argued often about the distinct and important ties that exist between working and learning. Through his community and cooperative organizing efforts in the Basque region of Spain, Don José María was able to tirelessly paint education as the core to any successful implementation of revolutionary change towards democratic workplaces and a just society.

Mondragón is currently one of the largest worker cooperatives in the world and is an impressive and vital example of worker’s self-management and democracy. It is, in fact, a co-op of co-ops – held together via a cooperative bank, a cooperative congress, a dedication towards expanding democratic-economic opportunities, and the overall cooperative experience. The first cooperative of the Mondragón group was a child of a school built with the labor and the capital of a community desperate for social justice and economic security. The community of now 100,000 workers has its roots in a school that begun with twelve-pupils. Five of these pupils went on to start Ulgor, the first cooperative of the Mondragón movement. Their teacher, Don José María, continued to be involved with the new movement and wielded great influence over its direction and message. Thus, this cooperative movement was created out of an educational movement; consequently, the natures of working and learning have become inseparable in the experience.

There are many written documentations of the overall history, structure, and functions of Mondragón. This will not be one of them. Instead, this discussion will specifically focus on the philosophy of education that makes up the cooperative experience and specific educational implementations that exist within the Mondragón structure. In addition, it would take a great deal of time to explore every single aspect of Mondragón’s educational model (the primary schools, research institutes, the training methods of workers, the University of Mondragón, and so on), and to analyze both the promising aspects and those characteristics that need improvement. Therefore, this conversation will focus on particular examples that should be regarded as inspirational models.

Mondragón is by no means perfect, but there are multitudes of critical lessons to draw from its example. Throughout this dialogue, we will explore four specific arguments: 1) Cooperativism as an educational movement that uses economics is an exemplary model, and socialized knowledge is a direct prerequisite to socioeconomic progress and justice; 2) Mondragón’s link between workplace democracy and learning-place democracy are strong in the schools, but imperfect; 3) democratic and ongoing education is not only important in the promotion and establishment of cooperativism and workplace democracy, but it is also crucial to the continued maintenance and safeguarding of such movements and institutions; and 4) the Mondragón workplaces of democracy are also learning-places of democracy.

It All Started With a School

“It has been said,” Don José María wrote, “that cooperativism is an economic movement that uses education; we can also alter the definition, affirming that it is an educational movement that uses economic action” (Morrison, 1993). From both this quote and the one we began with, it can be determined that Don José María saw a distinctive and inseparable link between work and education. Among the Mondragón movement, Don José María is regarded as an almost sacred figure. This community organizer’s words and works are still used for inspiration and guidance, and the existing morals of the cooperative experience remain heavily rooted in his teachings. In fact, while I spent time at Mondragón, one cooperator explained that the movement was in need of a new Don José María Arizmendiarrieta – a true leader, an inspirer. These words were spoken as the entire world, including the Basque country and Spain, began to see banks around the globe crumble and a new economic crisis was being unraveled. As global capitalism crashed down onto itself, the Mondragón cooperative experience was certain it would survive. It had done fine in the calamity of the 1980’s, and it was structured with the intent purpose on the just sharing of wealth and burden, which would help to cushion the blow of the 2000’s (something the rest of the world was just beginning to realize). Even with all of this, they were still looking to an educator and an organizer who had jump started the cooperative journey in the 1940’s – and who helped the democratic work-experience thrive despite its existence within a repressive, fascist state. (Travel Notes, 2008) Therefore, it is important for any of us interested in a new, cooperative, and humane form of economics to examine this rich history.

In 1941, a young priest named Don José María Arizmendiarrieta was assigned by the Catholic Church to a small, obscure, and war-ravaged town by the name of Mondragón. This town, which was in the Basque region of Spain, was suffering under a ruthless tyrant and recovering from the Civil War. Franco’s regime suppressed the Basque language and culture and had killed the leaders of the town or forced them to flee. While it might seem that entering a town as a priest was an influential role at the time, the Basque Church had not sided with the rest of the Catholic Church during the Civil War and had opposed Franco (Kurlansky, 2001). Yet, almost immediately, Don José María began to teach religious and human values at the only local apprentice school. This school was part of a steel company (the Union Cerrajera), but it only admitted the children of its employees, plus about 10 to 12 other students per year. These students were then obligated to work for the company. In all, this served only about 15% of Mondragón youth who might have been interested in furthering their education. Don José María came to realize that this teaching post would not allow him the opportunity to reach and effect the youth of the town. Despite his offers to help raise the funds to expand enrollment at the apprentice school, the firm refused any such action. (Morrison, 1993), (Mondragon Cooperative Experience, 2007)

Rather than surrendering to defeat, Don José María took action. The priest traveled around the small town and presented the residents with a proposal for a new independent training school. Following this, Don José María placed ballot boxes on street corners and asked folks to indicate their willingness to support such an enterprise. An overwhelming 600 responses came in, pledging support with either cash or some other form of contribution. October of 1943 saw the grand opening of a new community-run training school, called the Escuela Profesional (or in Basque: Eskola Politekinoa), with twenty pupils ready to start. (Morrison, 1993), (Mondragon Cooperative Experience, 2007)

As the means to make this school possible came directly from the population of Mondragón itself, it seemed only right that the contributors should elect the school’s management committee (Morrison, 1993). In addition, the students played a critical role in the fund-raising efforts, and Don José María organized those who were invested in the college to perform community service, including fixing homes and other basic necessities, to garnish more support from the population (Travel Notes, 2008). From the beginning, Don José María turned towards members and participants of the new training school for self-financing self-governance. Easier paths were avoided, such as placing the school under the control of the Catholic Church (Mondragon Cooperative Experience, 2007). In 1947, with the support, guidance, and organizing of Don José María – twelve students of the first graduating class continued their education with five-year University studies (Morrison, 1993). In 1955, five of these pupils founded the first industrial cooperative, named Ulgor, in the town of Mondragón. As more cooperatives sprung from this training school and cooperative movement, and as they became linked through inter-cooperation and the formation of the Caja Laboral (the cooperative bank), the school itself grew and become more complex. It itself transformed into an education cooperative; cooperative elementary schools plus other training and educational ventures formed into The League of Education and Culture (now called the Hezibide Elkartea); and in 1997, the University of Mondragón was born. Today, there are well over 45,000 pupils in cooperative and educational programs in the Mondragón structure: from elementary schools, to research institutes that serve to make inquiries for other Mondragón cooperative businesses, and to adult education facilities (Morrison, 1993), (Travel Notes, 2008).

It has been recognized that Mondragón’s schools were largely the foundation for its existing cooperative system. These schools, institutes, and programs helped develop technically trained, competent, and free-thinking workers and the foundations for specialized co-ops. It is important here to recognize that the training that students and workers received was more than just technical. Instead, the Mondragón educational systems were also providing social and ethical education that was considered inseparable components to the technical training for the cooperative experience (Morrison, 1993), (Travel Notes, 2008). This is an essential component because of the direct challenge it posed to the traditional “the son of an engineer shall be an engineer and the son of a worker, a worker” (Mondragon Cooperative Experience, 2007) social model. Consequently, this method also trains a worker to be a free-thinker, and thus allowing the worker to engage in the democratic workplace experience – and additionally to combat any form of worker subordination. In the early days, this model that characterized the schools of Mondragón helped lead pupils to participation in the cooperative enterprises and helped motivate future decisions (Morrison, 1993).

Before beginning the first cooperative, the early students spent up to eleven years in environments that cherished cooperative values. And by the time the first co-op began, there were more workers who had come to share cooperative ideals. They had been exposed to the teachings of Don José María, the other teachers, the community members who supported the enterprises, and the other students. Although it should be recognized that it wasn’t the Escuela Profesional intention to start a cooperative movement, that is what it de facto accomplished through democratic risk taking and decision making.

The Educational Philosophies of Don José María Arizmendiarrieta

As illustrated, Don José María Arizmendiarrieta was an instrumental figure in the initial creation of the Mondragón cooperative system. Yet, he continued to play a leading and transformative role in the continued development and expansion of the movement. Through his wielding of great influence, Don José María was able to impact the future of the huge cooperative movement that sprung out of the tiny Basque town. What follows bellow will be an exploration of his philosophies, writings, and influences regarding working and learning.

For Don José María, education was simply good economics. Without education, scarce goods and services would go unproduced or undistributed. Alongside this, Don José María argued, education is an indispensible element to the emancipation of the worker. A redistribution of wealth is essential to the overall cooperative movement, but without the socialization of knowledge there is no way to humanize and democratize work. “Teaching,” he wrote, “should be ongoing in order to be effective. Tools and machines need to be continuously renewed but above all there has to be a renewal in the mentality of human beings because they are destined to be the masters or these tools” (Arizmendiarrieta, 2007). The worker, then, must experience ongoing education in order to participate in a democratic workplace. But in addition to this, the workplace must be a place of learning for the worker – so that the worker avoids becoming a tool or a part of a larger machine. Education in the cooperative movement is thus not only a critical part for the starting and maintaining processes of a co-op, but it is also an indispensable element in the safeguarding of the movement from a takeover by tyrants. Don José María, however, took it further:

Knowledge is power and in order to democratize power, one must socialize knowledge beforehand. We accomplish nothing with the proclamation of rights, if afterwards the people whose rights we have proclaimed are incapable of administering those rights or if, to be able to act, these people have no recourse but to count on only a few indispensable members in the group.

(Arizmendiarrieta, 2007)

The Mondragón cooperative movement as we know it today begun in a small, war-torn, and extremely impoverished town. The people who populated the movement were under a double oppression: first from the militaristic and economic forces of a fascist state, and second for being Basque – whose language, culture, and leaders were brutally repressed. These may have been several factors that led Don José María to proclaim that we must fight economic poverty directly alongside the “poverty of intellect” (Arizmendiarrieta, 2007). The poverty of intellect, or rather the control of knowledge, is an authoritative mechanism used to keep the powerful in power and the poor in poverty. We can determine that Don José María was correct about this. Mondragón the town, as it is today, has grown extensively and now holds over twenty-two thousand residents and its economic poverty has chiefly been erased, largely due to the cooperative movement that it spawned (Travel Notes, 2008).

Don José María noticed a trend amongst communities whose economies improved due to revolutionary movements. In such movements, he argued, education is grabbed by a privileged few who generally come from a single social class. This “implies an anti-economic and anti-social enslavement at the same time,” he insisted. This could not be allowed in the young and growing Mondragón cooperative movement.

The socialization of education, the access to it by everyone in the community without discrimination, the granting of opportunities to all persons… are fundamental postulates of all social movements of our times. The proclamation of human rights that are not matched by economic and educational guarantees are ephemeral concessions just for show and are destined to produce poor results… These people must be concerned with education, because only slavery will be found if they follow the path of illiteracy and ignorance instead.

(Arizmendiarrieta, 2007)

Learning Cooperatives

In 1997, three cooperative schools of the Mondragón movement – a business school, an engineering school, and a humanities and education school – came together to form Mondragón University. To this date, the University now consists of these departments and other research centers. It is also home to the two innovative examples of ALECOP and Saiolan (we will come to these shortly) which demonstrate what can be accomplished with a cooperative learning movement. (Travel Notes, 2008)

The structure of Mondragón University itself is a complicated one, and it consists of both promising and lackluster elements. The University is a cooperative, made up of students, faculty, staff, and more. When the University began, it used essentially traditional teaching techniques: teacher-centered, focused on the transmission of knowledge, almost completely exam and lecture centered, and the works. However, in recent years, it has adopted an educational strategy known as Mendeberri, which is similar in many ways to the philosophy of Paulo Freire. This model is learner-centered, focused on the learner’s integration of knowledge, problem and project based, and more. (Morrison, 1993), (Travel Notes, 2008)

Yet, it would be a completely separate discussion to asses all of the pros and cons of the Mondragón University system. So instead, we shall focus heavily on two inspirational and informative programs of the University.

ALECOP

ALECOP is a unique cooperative that was begun by students in 1963. Its heritage is found in the dawn of the Escuela Profesional; and in fact, it was the brain child of Don José María Arizmendiarrieta. ALECOP was founded to solve the issue that some students needed to help provide the income of their family and to cover tuition costs. The solution was to combine work and study, and to provide students with jobs that would still function as a part of their educational experience. This concept allowed for the formation of a training school that would function specifically through both learning and working. Such education would allow students training in the company, work experience, money to cover tuition, and general income. The institute identifies itself as a social project, with economic and social goals and outcomes.

Today, ALECOP is a company which “leads in the development of educational projects abroad,” (ALECOP, 2008) and it is currently the primary manufacturer of teaching resources in Spain. In addition, the co-op designs, develops, manufactures, and sells other materials – including: electronics, automotive parts, telecommunication components, and more. Student members of ALECOP are enrolled in Mondragón University or other vocational, training, trade, and community schools that are in one way or another linked to the cooperative enterprise.

Approximately four hundred individuals are currently active members in the co-op. Three hundred-fifty of these are student-members while the remaining fifty are worker-members. However, ALECOP is not large enough to provide jobs for every single one of these student-members, and only one hundred-twenty work directly in the co-op. The remaining student-members are provided jobs in another Mondragón cooperative (these students are still regarded as members of ALECOP and are privy to all of its resources and educational characteristics). Student members spend half of their day working and the other half studying. However, both of these activities are regarded as equal components to their education. On average, a student spends a year and a half working in ALECOP or another cooperative. However, once they graduate, they can remain at their ALECOP job for up to an additional year. An average salary for a student-member is 500 euro a month (670 dollars). Like any Mondragón cooperative, students must make a capital contribution when entering. ALECOP’s rate is 600 Euros (800 dollars). However, this does not get paid with a lump sum. Instead, this is assumed from their wages – 75 Euros over 8 months. As with the workers for every Mondragón co-op, the student-members take part in the profits and interests of ALECOP. Students can distribute their hours of work over different days to fit their school schedules. It is true that their pay is less than a normal Mondragón cooperative’s, but it is much more than other jobs they would have access to during their time as students. (Travel Notes, 2008), (ALECOP, 2008). Additionally, it is comparatively much better than many work-study programs in United States schools.

In ALECOP, it is the goal for students to learn competence (skill) development. The cooperative breaks this down into five groups: 1) technical skills; 2) methodological competence; 3) participative skills; 4) personal competence; and these all flow into 5) professional competence. The institute argues that these develop the specific competences and skills of decision-making techniques, teamwork, building a global vision of work, information and communication, work involvement, planning and organizing, and putting critical thought into solving problems. In fact, ALECOP has a precise definition of what it means by “competence,” which each student-member develops: “To collaborate with others in working to achieve common aims, exchanging information, assuming responsibility and dealing with any conflicts and problems that arise.” (ALECOP, 2008), (Travel Notes, 2008)

Each student-member of ALECOP works with a specific “tutor,” or educator, who is a full time worker-member and owner of the co-op (just as the student-members are owners as well). This educator and member works with students on specific skills. The tutors work with students, make sure everything is functioning properly in the cooperative, and serve as the managing core. In addition, they also provide the curriculum and projects for students to work on. To put it into perspective, consider ALECOP a cooperative training ground. Students who are part of the cooperative have a wide range of different job opportunities and further paths for advancement in the company. However, each job has a different set of learning goals, skills, and outcomes. Thus, no one student’s experience is the same. (ALECOP, 2008), (Travel Notes, 2008)

At ALECOP, there is a system of evaluation and encouragement for students, which is known as ATEKO. In the beginning of their tenure, students are trained in the functioning of ALECOP, they are integrated into the enterprise, and an initial assessment of their skills takes place. Following initial work exposure and experience, the students then plan activities, projects, goals, and a path to continue down – while they continue to develop experience in a democratic workplace. Students continually work with a tutor-advisor, who provides them with information, follow-up, support, and evaluation. Throughout their period of involvement in the co-op, students choose a work path to follow (such as worker skills, managerial experience, and so on) and an area of development to be involved with (such as automotive, educational, mechanical, electronics, and more). At the end of their time in ALECOP, the students negotiate a cooperative evaluation of their experience with their tutor-advisor. The assessment process of the student’s work is based on the development of their transferable skills. This final step is to contrast and compare the two views of the student and the tutor, who collaborate on an outcome (this evaluation process was designed by the worker-members). Such a practice is unique to ALECOP, and is not experienced at any other part of Mondragón University.

It is worth noting that a few years ago, ALECOP was experiencing financial difficulties, so the cooperative’s main focus was in economic security. However, the situation has since stabled, and so the institute is able to provide more focus for other interests. Yet, this does expose one potential turbulent spot for the co-op’s existence as an educational project.

The governing structure of ALECOP is evenly divided between student-members and worker-members and students equally share responsibilities in managing, governing, and guiding the cooperative. Additionally, every student-member has the right and “duty” to take part in the Mondragón general assembly, social council, and all other aspects of the cooperative experience that every Mondragón co-op is involved with. (ALECOP, 2008), (Travel Notes, 2008).

During my time in ALECOP, I was able to speak with a few students and each one praised the experience and cooperative with the highest of words. While that is no scientific study of the overall satisfaction of the student body, those who I talked to had an infectious and convincing commitment to ALECOP. One student attested that before coming to ALECOP, and even with their experience at Mondragón University, they had no understanding or knowledge about economics. However, the experiential education that they were involved in at ALECOP gave them a competent background in the subject. And what were they studying to become? An English teacher. (ALECOP, 2008), (Travel Notes, 2008).

Saiolan

Saiolan is another unique example of the fusion of work and learning that comprises the cooperative movement. Located in the town of Mondragón, it identifies itself as “Business Innovation Center” that functions as a cooperative. It has existed for over twenty years and it is a part of Mondragón University. The mission of Saiolan is to promote new activities for the direct creation of new companies, the diversification of currently existing companies, and/or the innovation of products, services, or processes. With its students and faculty, Saiolan seeks to proactively identify new needs and to focus on the integration of entrepreneurs, “feasibility studies,” and prototypes. (Saiolan, 2008)

At the time of Saiolan’s founding in 1981, Mondragón University had yet to be formed. Thus, it was founded as a part of the Escuela Politécnica de Mondragón (the engineering school). In 1985, it was transformed into its own independent department of the Technical Office in the engineering school. In 1986, Saiolan launched its first two enterprises – the first focusing on technical software, and the other working in industrial design. The project was so successful that in 1997 it created an incubator building for new companies. The year 2000 saw the start of collaboration between Saiolan and the URRATSBAT program of the Basque government, with the intent to expand the “entrepreneur culture” to Vocational Training Centers (Sailoan, 2008).

In addition to proactively identifying new needs, Saiolan’s students and faculties work on creating new businesses and activities – within and outside of Mondragón. The creators of such undertakings, the students, are free to choose if these new projects will be cooperatives or not (Sailoan, 2008). While it is in the Mondragón mission statement to create new jobs, such ambitions are labeled “preferable.” While companies must be complete cooperatives (everyone is a worker-owner, and there are no employees) to be a part of the Mondragón system, the movement refuses to force new businesses and jobs they help create into being cooperatives. Worker cooperatives are arenas for workplace democracy, and it must be a free choice to engage in such an experience (Travel Notes, 2008).

For funding and future development, Saiolan works intensely alongside the MCC (Mondragón Cooperative Corporation); Mondragón University; the Caja Laboral; and the Basque Government to name a few. Alongside faculty members, students – or preferably a group of students – will come up with an idea. Following this, they study the market, the technology needed, and the economy. This idea is researched and a plan is formed. Students may either work independently, with other Mondragón cooperatives, or some other existing company. Once this has all been determined, the students launch a “prototype real market test.” With the success of this, or the necessary adjustments made, the students will then launch their idea into the real market. These projects can be anything between new companies, new products, new processes, a spin-off, and more. Saiolan, for their part, offers support, tailored and customized coaching, economic resources, laboratories and other technical needs, as well as collaboration with Mondragón University teachers, and more. In total, Saiolan has helped generate over 127 new companies, of which only 25 have thus far closed (that’s a survival rate of over 80%). However, the institute admits that with the job creation explosion, quality has been sacrificed for quantity – but they are working on resolving this quandary. (Sailoan, 2008), (Travel Notes, 2008)

Learning as Revolution; Working as Revolution

Mondragón has always believed and upheld that the ongoing education, training, and learning opportunities for workers, managers, and all other participants in the cooperative enterprise is essential (MacLeod, 1998). This is a vital aspect of Mondragón for several reasons. First, Mondragón is dependent on the ideas of all of its workers. As one cooperator of Mondragón that I met was fond of saying, “100,000 workers means 100,000 opportunities.”  Additionally, the majority of promotions and advancements come within the cooperatives themselves. It is therefore important to keep workers with an active mind, thinking critically, and up to par on everything. Both the current operations of the organization as well as its future are completely dependent upon the workers themselves. (Travel Notes, 2008)

As We Build the Road as We Travel, a history and study of the Mondragón cooperative movement by Roy Morrison, argues: the age of industrialism is over. No longer do we participate in a world that is divided mostly amongst capitalist and socialist lines. Conflicts are much more entangled, and this requires fresh and new solutions. Mondragón, Morrison states, puts an emphasis on new solutions to “social reconstruction.” While Mondragón should not be regarded as the “answer,” it should be considered an illustration of social and economic change that comes from below and is controlled from below (Morrison, 1993). It needs to be understood that the Mondragón example is based upon the fusion of working as learning and learning as working. The following is one of the ten cooperative principles of Mondragón, as quoted in We Build:

Education is essential for fulfilling the basic cooperative principles. It is fundamentally important to devote sufficient human and economic resources to cooperative education, professional training, and general education of young people for the future.

(Morrison, 1993, Page 12)

The notion that work was a matter of suffering intended by biblical commands, for humanity to toil following its expulsion from paradise, was universally rejected by Mondragón from its very origins. As the Basque country is a densely catholic region, this concept was near revolutionary. Work was instead a means of both individual and collective renewal and for building community. Don José María, in his Reflections, stated this, “Work constitutes a good, renewable day by day…the antidote to correct social and mental imbalance…Work [is] the best means in the search for social peace” (Arizmendiarrieta, 2007).

One example of this can come from my experience in a factory of the largest industrial Mondragón cooperative, FAGOR. While touring the factory, the group I was with pointed to a large board in the middle of the plant that seemed to have a lot of activity, and we asked what it was for. The cooperator who was showing us around informed the group that, among other things, this board was used by the worker-owners to share information, advice, knowledge, and recommendations. “Like what?” we asked. She did not speak perfect English, but she was able to demonstrate: “Well, if a person is working, and they are doing this,” she made a motion indicating she was using a screwdriver on a washing machine, “but then they figure out, oh wait, it is both faster and better for your back to do this,” she made an motion suggesting she was now using the screw driver on a different part of the washing machine, “then they come to this board and they let everyone know.” If it turns out to be correct, she explained, then management will study it, try to enhance it and implement it, and then spread the idea to the other factories. “All of our new ideas are very dependent on all of the workers,” she explained happily. The cooperator went on to explain that this board was the center of innovation in the factory, where workers share their ideas, improve the cooperative, and see direct benefits from it (because the more the company profits the more the individuals profit in health, promotion, confidence, community, and more). In this one minute example, we can begin to see a world of cooperative working through cooperative learning (Travel Notes, 2008). Joint-knowledge is a built in structure to the cooperative experience, and as We Build sates, “cooperativism is the development of the individual not against others but with others” (Morrison, 1993, page 11).

What this also emphasizes is that knowledge in Mondragón is not a commodity but instead a social tool and a tool of solidarity. In a discussion with another cooperator in the same factory, she emphasized and expressed pride in the fact that the Mondragón co-ops encourage inter-cooperation and the mutual sharing of information and knowledge. This is where Don José María’s proclamation that socialized knowledge results in cooperative economics becomes evident.

Mondragón was born from an apprentice industrial-training school. Since that time, the individual co-ops and the cooperative movement has grown and strengthened their educational basis and missions. As described, Mondragón’s education can be seen in its schools. Additionally, these programs are directly responsible for creating cooperative jobs. Yet, the wide-range of educational involvement in Mondragón expands from day care to universities and from primary education to continuing education and postgraduate classes (MacLeod, 1998). Mondragón’s deep concern with education can be traced back to its early days, when the movers and shakers of the movement were convinced that the future would be determined by those who controlled the best technology (Morrison, 1993). The Basque region of Spain had undergone many atrocities during and after Franco’s rise to power. However, the town of Mondragón was only a little ways away from another small, but well-known village. The town of Guernica had met a tragic fate when Franco invited Hitler to try out the German’s new planes, technology, and form of war-fare on the small town. For hours, Guernica was ripped apart by the fascist forces. It served as both a dark reminder to the Basque people of Franco’s brutality, but also how his military success in the Spanish Civil War was due to technology provided by Hitler and Mussolini (Kurlansky, 2001). The leaders of the Mondragón movement knew that cooperativism would thus have to promote humanity at work alongside the continued intellectual development of the collective and the individual. Technology had decided the fascist takeover of Spain, but it could also provide a liberated future. Such a future, however, would have to come through not just critique, rhetoric, or revolutionary replacement of leaders. The foundation for this future would have to come from the “creation of a new reality” (Morrison, 1993) forged by learning, working, and social practice.

Hierarchy of work and knowledge is the livelihood of the capitalist structure. However, equilibrium of and between work, learning, and knowledge is the foundation of the Mondragón cooperative movement. In the capitalist system, knowledge is recognized as a commodity which people must prove their worthiness of having or their wealth to just buy it. Yet, in Mondragón, we witness the fusion of democratic work and socialized knowledge (Arizmendiarrieta, 2007). Yet, this hierarchy – which is so imperative to the maintenance of capitalism – is propped up by the false notion of scarce materials and fabricated needs (Morrison, 1993). For this reason, it is essential for Mondragón and the cooperative movement in general to provide equal and equitable educational opportunities for its workers, consumers and all community members. The very survival of cooperatives depends on their adherence to the equilibrium, because true cooperatives cannot work within the same structure of hierarchy that capitalism utilizes. Hierarchy and capitalism must teach a certain few to lead and the rest to obey these leaders. The equilibrium of Mondragón, then, must strike a balance and transparent field between all. No one person must be given access to learning and knowledge over others.

The importance of the equilibrium of knowledge and the stress put on developing the best technology as possible highlights the importance of shared-knowledge between workers. In a strict-hierarchy the elite controls access to, discovery and implementation of, and the benefits from knowledge. In Mondragón, however, it is crucial for all to work towards the mutual discovery of knowledge and to share in the access to and benefits from it (Travel Notes, 2008). This is reflective of the cooperatives themselves: isolated and alone, they are week. Yet, working together makes them strong. Individually, workers can be subjected easily – but together as a cooperative force, they are dynamic (MacLeod, 1998). Mondragón demonstrates that together we can strive for more than just survival or supremacy. By exercising our freedoms to learn and to work with liberty and cooperation, we have the ability to construct communities (Morrison, 1993).

A system put into place with force will always depend on a system of force to be maintained, even one that is supposed to promote work, learning, and unity. From the onset, then, Mondragón has always considered itself a way to bring about non-violent revolution (MacLeod, 1998). This is why Don José María argued that work and learning should be viewed as a process of renewal, and not a mark of sin. Just as importantly, Mondragón provides an economic base for a social shift in society. It provides a path that is successfully non-violent in movement, and thus will not require violence to maintain. The learning and working emphasized by Mondragón are therefore the roads to revolution.

A capitalist corporation can be identified as an association of capital. In this system, those who control capital control the knowledge, the work, and therefore the power. Worker cooperatives, however, are an association of people (MacLeod, 1998). In these cooperative systems there must be equal control and access to knowledge and learning. All work and workers are regarded as equals, and their worth is not determined by their capital. In Mondragón, individuals work together – not against one another. In order for this to succeed, they must share power equally. And this power is channeled through access to and control over cooperative work and learning.

The Survival of Mondragón

It is interesting to examine how Mondragón has survived first in a fascist state and now in a capitalist-dominated world. Even more significant is to understand that Mondragón’s economic success was first accomplished by people with access to no significant material assets. It was constructed in an obscure, industrial town in the aftermath of Franco’s victory. Most of the town’s leaders had been killed or fled, and unions were outlawed (Travel Notes, 2008). There were no major funders for this new vision, no philanthropy groups that guided it along, or anything of that nature. It was built with the backs of the people who it was meant to serve. In almost every other part of the world, industrialism had been used to control and manipulate the masses of workers. However, Mondragón, the worker cooperative movement, rose as a direct response to industrialism. Thus, we should identify social development as a major key to its economic advance. The movement was building factories, starting cooperative businesses, and producing goods – but all of this served as a means to construct from below a new “cooperative social reality.” The solidarity of the movement was built on both economic and social roads (Morrison, 1993). Today, it only continues to expand and rapidly reach more individuals and communities. In 1988, Mondragón had around 21,000 cooperators (MacLeod, 1998); in 2008, they have roughly 100,000 in all regions of Spain – and it is beginning to consist of workers from South America, Asia, the Caribbean, and more.

Much has been written about Mondragón’s survival surrounding the creation of the Caja Laboral and like factors, but this discussion has primarily focused on the importance of education to the construction and survival of the cooperative experience. This is crucially important because the Mondragón experience depends upon the capability and competence of every single worker, who are each individual owners of their co-ops and full participants in the cooperative experience. Unlike some other historical examples, Mondragón is not a form of cooperativism that is imposed from above by the state or for some sort of corporate reform. It was built from the bottom up, a social experience engaged fully by all of its participants (Morrison, 1993). One path depends upon the higher powers for survival, while the other is maintained by its own structure. The lesson that we can take from Mondragón is that the basic strengths of the system lies in its cooperative behaviors of working and learning (Morrison, 1993).

In most of Europe and the United States, cooperatives are generally isolationist and minor in the main economy. From its start, Mondragón knew that it had to work against this trend. For this to succeed, each new cooperative would have to be connected with one another through associations such as the Caja Laboral, shared capital, solidarity, shared principles, and shared knowledge (MacLeod, 1998), (Travel Notes, 2008). This is why the cooperative movement is so involved in educational experiences, ranging from consumer education to the continued training of workers, and from primary schools to the University. As Greg MacLeod, author of From Mondragón to America, argued, there cannot be fundamental changes in society unless these changes come from the building blocks (MacLeod, 1998). Mondragón, for its part, has recognized that the inseparable relation between working and learning is a key to creating this fundamental change.

Bibliography

Arizmendiarrieta, Don José María. Reflections. Bilbao: Mondragon, 2007.

Kurlansky, Mark. The Basque History of the World : The Story of a Nation. New York: Penguin (Non-Classics), 2001.

MacLeod, Gregory. From Mondragon to America : Experiments in Community Economic Development. New York: Cape Breton UP, 1998.

Morrison, Roy. We Build the Road As We Travel : Mondragon’s Cooperative Society. New York: New Society, Limited, 1993.

Saiolan. Rep.No. Technical Office of Escuela Politécnica de Mondragón, Saiolan.

“Travel Notes,” From Trip to Mondragón. Taken by Brian Van Slyke, 2008.

Whyte, William F., and Kathleen K. Whyte. Making Mondragon : The Growth and Dynamics of the Worker Cooperative Complex. New York: Cornell UP, 1991.

Welcome to ALECOP. Rep.No. ALECOP, Mondragón. 2008.

By Brian Van Slyke

This is the first in our new series “History of Schools.” Please note, also, that this is a first attempt and it needs some editing.

Introduction

The history of mass and forced schooling in the United States can speak a great deal to the current nature of our educational model. It can also help us understand the culture of work in this nation. Our contemporary structure of education prepares the vast majority of the country’s children for a specific form of work that mirrors the industries that arose during the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. Compulsory schooling’s legacy thus has much to teach us about our current society – and also where we can go from here.

Yet, when this topic is discussed, it is often dichotomized into a tail of heroes and villains, purely nefarious forces or people’s movements. In reality, as is the story of nearly all political, social, economic, and cultural histories; compulsory schooling was born out of a mixture of aims from different groups, movements, interested parties, and alliances. In the end, the alliance in favor of compulsory schooling was victorious. Resistance and non-compliance ensued; but the most powerful faction of the pro-compulsory schooling alliance, some of society’s elite citizenry and businesses, were able to effectively enforce the system and tailor it to their interests and goals. While humanitarian players were involved in the initial implementation of compulsory schooling, including anti-exploitative child labor concerns and labor unions, their struggles were usurped by the powerful and were instead used to create a mass population of diligent, obedient, and complacent workers and “Americanized” citizens.

It is therefore important to examine the driving factors behind compulsory schooling and its immediate aftermath. Such an exploration will allow us to exam what systems our current structure of education serves, how it came into being, and what lessons we can take away from these histories to help us work for a more just and equitable future.

This is the story of compulsory education.

Colonial Massachusetts and the Prussian Empire

It all began with Massachusetts. The first compulsory school attendance law in the United States was passed in this small, but powerful, northeastern state. While required attendance became law in Massachusetts in 1852, it is vital to realize that the story of mass education in the United States goes beyond this and has its roots and origins in other historical moments.

While still a colony of Great Britain, Massachusetts had its very first encounter with compulsory education in 1642. The rationale that lay behind this law was the colony’s need for both social control and economic survival (Deffenbaugh, 1914). At the time, Massachusetts was a small colony and a religious community struggling for survival on a vast continent it knew little about. Thus, in order to survive, these early puritans felt that parents had a “moral obligation” to provide an education for their children and apprentices, who were to be raised as proper puritans. In addition, the children were to be trained as “honest labor” – not part of a “pauper class.” Leaders of the colony became fearful that this obligation was not being met and that too many parents and masters were neglecting their child-raising duties and responsibilities. This, they believed, was putting the continued existence of the community at dire risk (Katz, 1976), (Ensign, 1969).

Education in the early colonial period was much different than that of one based around schools or school-houses. Rather, its primary focus was on work with parents, the passing on of chores, apprenticeships, or through some other form of work (Katz, 1976). However, the point of this new act was to especially focus, as the law proclaimed, on the children’s “ability to read and understand the principles of religion and the capital laws of their country” (Deffenbaugh, 1914). While the law emphasized what should be taught, it did not give direction as to where this instruction should take place. It did not have to happen in a school room but could just be added onto the duties of parents or masters (Deffenbaugh, 1914).

This changed in 1647. With the leaders of Massachusetts feeling that parents and masters were still ignoring their duties and now also the law, an amendment to the 1642 decree proclaimed that any town with fifty or more households was to provide an instructor to take over the educational duties of the town’s children. The 1647 measurement proclaimed that the “old deluder, Satan” was infiltrating the Massachusetts colony and that the children must be trained in the religious, social, and economic structures of the colony and puritan life correctly. This was something that the leaders deemed they could no longer trust within the ordinary citizens to perform. Social, religious, and economic instruction and control was to be handed over to the colony elite (Deffenbaugh, 1914).  However, this compulsory education measure did not find much support amongst the population and parents, and it remained largely ignored. In the end, this first attempt at compulsory schooling failed because it lacked support and compliance from the towns and residents of Massachusetts (Katz, 1976). Although this effort died out, the idea of compulsion schooling as a means of social and economic control did not.

The story now jumps almost two-hundred years into the future, where the world found itself shocked at the defeat of the most feared French general by a small, resource-poor country named Prussia. Only a short time ago, Napoleon had trounced the heavily militarized nation into a panic. Suddenly, out of nowhere, the country turned the tables and helped end the rule of the mighty French Emperor. Around the globe, Prussia’s surprising victory was attributed to the basis of their new social and economic order: mass, compulsory schooling (Gatto, 2003).

What’s important to realize about Prussia is that they weren’t the first to implement compulsory schooling, but that they were the first example of a truly successful enforcement and utilization of the system. After a thousand years of a fragmented Germany, the divisions that kept it apart were finally mended by this new societal structure. And while it was a resource poor area, under the new system of schooling, private industry surged, and the Prussian army became one of the most powerful on the planet – demanding respect from leaders worldwide. (Gatto, 2003)

The Prussian idea of compulsory education, which was one of the most respected of the day, identified the following as the ideal outcomes of a centralized form of schooling: obedient soldiers, obedient and subordinate workers for industry and agriculture, and an almost total uniformity amongst the ideas and opinions of the citizens it produced – to name a few. This system, which was up and running in full by 1819, was recognized as the absolute best way to defeat the new and potentially powerful menace that was the industrial proletariat. As well, Prussia’s system of mass schooling seemed to create sudden material prosperity and military might for the German people all throughout the 19^th century. It is important to note that this impressive method of mass social and economic control would influence national leaders and elites all across the planet. In 1868, for example, Japan adopted large themes and portions of the Prussian constitution. With this, it also modeled the Prussian style of education (Gatto, 2003).

An Idea of Utopia

Back in the United States, the Civil War had shaken the young country to its bones. But it also gave rise to a new discussion and vision shared amongst the policy elite of the northeast. These were discussions of utopian visions, fueled by the newly founded conviction that the “productive potential” of machinery that ran on coal was limitless. Localized and village-central life was becoming a thing of the past – railroads and telegraphs shrunk distances, and a new governing mind was being born. It was essential to the triumph of this new vision that a vast amount of “human resource” could be manipulated and used as a massive “workforce” (Gatto, 2003). Industry had been shaken by the Civil War, but it was on the rise once again (Deffenbaugh, 1914).

Taking a hint from the Prussian success, these utopian idealists also considered compulsory schooling the key to defeating the power that the “idiosyncratic family” had over society (Gatto, 2003). The 1642 colonial law had been a failure largely due to this power, which had been regarded as the primary source of education for centuries. Children were taught almost all of their social, economic, and cultural beliefs within the family unit. This structure would have to be destroyed in order to make room for the new utopian way (Gatto, 2003): one which would depend on the Prussian model of an obedient, uniform citizen and a subservient worker.

Along these lines, before the country could become modernized, both the past and the present had to be completely uprooted. The village cultures, tight-knit family structures, “pious populations,” and an overall sense of an independent livelihood would need to be done away with. However, the United States lacked the structures of other industrializing countries to make powerful shifts in society – like the state religion of England and Germany and the centralized military force of France. However, with the innovative systems of mass and rapid transportation across great distances, these utopian visionaries saw that society could now function like an “orderly social hive.” These New England elites considered the chaos of the growing pains of cities and the unorganized immigrants as an advantage which they could utilize with mass regimentation. With great subordination, people could learn to emulate the actions and reliability of machines. The struggle to institute, expand, and strengthen centralized schooling in the United States was consequently a product of the country’s elite and powerful elements. The four major coal powers, J.P. Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, and Henry Ford all played a major role in the development in this new system. (Gatto, 2003)

Prior to the middle of the 19^th century, the responsibility to educate one’s child had remained firmly in the place of a child’s parent (Katz, 1976). This would all change and continue to be massively challenged when Massachusetts introduced its 1852 law. In fact, almost every advance in the expansion of compulsory school attendance and the child labor laws that were of the same movement can find its roots in the state of Massachusetts – or to those people who fashioned their visions inside of it (Ensign, 1969).

The Two Faces of Horace Mann

In order to understand the history of compulsory schooling in the United States, and especially its introduction to the state of Massachusetts, it is critical to recognize the two faces of Horace Mann. His name is invoked both by compulsory school critics and defenders, and his legacy is contrasted by these different parties as one of a school reformer versus a Prussian-influenced elite. These two historical memories may seem like completely different interpretations of a single individual, but instead they should be regarded as reconcilable.

In 1837, Massachusetts created a State Board of Education and it named Horace Mann to its secretaryship (Ensign, 1969), a position he filled from 1837 to 1848 (Katz, 1976). Horace Mann has often been lauded as a champion of anti-child labor legislation, but in fact he did not express direct concern with factory children until towards the end of his secretaryship. Yet, even when he did, he did not deem it important to resolve the unique problems that related education and labor. While he highly praised the factory act of 1836, which compelled children who were employed in factories to go to school twelve weeks a year, he complimented the factory owners and agents for their support of the law. Parents who attempted to evade these requirements, however, were to be condemned and Mann argued that they considered their children to be articles of property (Ensign, 1969). Mann failed to mention, however, that the family’s ability to scrape by a livelihood depended directly on the wages brought in by their children. Simply leaving work was not going to be so easy.

At the time of Horace Mann’s secretaryship, many political scientists deemed the parent control over a children’s upbringing and education to be a “principle of American democracy” (Ensign, 1969). While Mann wanted all children to be in school, he initially agreed with this sentiment. He wanted to battle the “evils of non-attendance” (Ensign, 1969) with other means than compulsion. However, Mann’s survey of the different European systems left him with a new outlook on what the functions and goals of education should be. There was one system in particular that impressed and convinced him more than any other: the now tried and tested Prussian method of forced and mass schooling (Ensign, 1969).

In Horace Mann’s Seventh Report to the Boston School Committee of 1843, he ranked the Prussian educational model as the finest system in the world (with England’s being the worst). In this report, he made the case to the Massachusetts State Board of Education that in order to catch up to the Prussians, the state and the nation would need to adopt their system of mass and compulsory schooling – before it was too late (Gatto, 2003). Mann had become convinced that the only solution to school non-attendance would have to be that of “state interference” (Ensign, 1969). In fact, he proclaimed that the State would have to assert itself as the “primary parent” of the child. On top of that, Mann argued, the school was “the cheapest [form of] police” (Gatto, 2003).

Furthering the message, Horace Mann argued that this system would glue together Christian ethics with democratic values; it would crush the wickedness of ignorance, as well as eliminating most crime and aristocratic privilege; and it would assimilate the immigrant masses, while morphing them into virtuous, industrious, and “Americanized” citizens (Katz, 1976).

It is interesting that while Mann promoted this argument, he also insisted that the common school knew no difference between the rich and the poor, or between those who were bond and those who were free. It would convert immoral individuals into do-gooders, and it was a tool to combat the evils that had rooted themselves in United States society and cities (Katz, 1976). This became the mantra that defined the pro-compulsory schooling movement and that was repeated to the masses and to the immigrants: mass, forced schooling would be a place where the playing field was level, where everyone was on the same stage, and where your class in society would not affect where you started and where you ended up. The rich would compete directly and fairly with the poor, and whoever was the best would come out on top (Althea & Woods, 2008). While this notion was a promising and appealing pledge, we will come to see that this was not what actually came to pass in the system of compulsion schooling.

An Industrializing Country

Early on in the 19^th century, the factory system of Massachusetts began to expand and grow in economic strength. Alongside this, the population of cities and villages increased significantly, and it was discovered that much of the manual labor that was needed to support this structure could be performed by children. As a result, those who were in poverty were exploited. Both children who had never been to school and those who were attending were taken from whatever life they were living and put to work in the factories and mines. Because of this new economic structure, many family incomes grew to be dependent on that which was produced by the labor of their children.

Especially in the forty years that separated 1820 and 1860, the enlargement of cities and villages changed the social and physical landscape of the United States. Before 1820, only five percent of the nation’s population resided in cities which contained more than 8,000 people. But by 1860 that number increased to over sixteen percent. In a matter of only decades, small towns turned into industrial “meccas” (Katz, 1976). A large portion of the increase in population was due to the waves of immigrants that poured into the country. This resulted in the dissolution of existing heterogeneity, and forced the United States to adopt a new dimension. The influx of new immigrants simultaneously fueled industrial growth while putting strains on the normalization of the “social fabric” (Katz, 1976). The city of New York alone had its population increase by tenfold between 1800 and 1850. The physical segregation of economic classes deepened, and the population increasingly depended on institutional resolutions to social troubles. In a response to this, social reformers attempted to rationalize charity, homogenize schools, and imprison vagrants. As Karl Kaestle, quoted in “A History of Compulsory Education Laws,” stated – this was “[a] general effort to impose systematic solutions on chaotic urban conditions” (Katz, 1976).

As different European groups entered the country, they brought their diverse cultures, customs, and languages with them – making major challenges to and reshaping the “character of the population” (Katz, 1976). This incoming of peoples was not welcomed by those who were both hostile to change and foreign languages and customs. The feelings of such people can be heard in the words of John Commings, as quoted in Compulsory School Attendance & Child Labor, “the number of destitute, ignorant, and criminal… increased until they began to press heavily upon the ways and means of public charity” (Ensign, 1969). Quick and continuing institutional and technological transformations put even further strains and struggles on city dwellers. In addition, the mass arrival of immigrants fueled cries and warnings of a “breakdown of the American culture” (Katz, 1976).

This was simultaneously matched by the expanding corporate state’s demands for extreme quantities of hardworking and submissive workers (Katz, 1976). This so-called need was filled by the cheapest workforce it could find, the immigrants. The children of immigrants, in particular, were manipulated and abused the most; they were forced into factories and mines, working for low wages and in horrible conditions, while the structure of the new industrial-economic system forced their families to become dependent on the wages they earned (Gatto, 2003). As child labor was increasingly being used and abused by the industrialists and factory-owners, adult laborers continued to lose their jobs and found it increasingly difficult to find new ones – as the children were willing to work for much lower wages. In 1842, a Massachusetts law restricted all children under the age of twelve to the maximum of a ten-hour workday. It is important to note that this bill also made significant changes to the labor-attendance law of the state, and gave more power to local school committees to enforce school attendance and prosecute for non-attendance. This law was backed by labor unions and was regarded as the first victory for organized labor in the lengthy drive for a shorter-work day, as well as a sign that labor unions were increasingly becoming involved in the extermination of child labor in order to provide more work for adults. It became increasingly obvious over time that the concern of working children was closely tied to that of labor unions and adult labor. (Ensign, 1969)

The Compulsory Schools

Thus, we can see in detail here how numerous forces came together in a complex web to drive Massachusetts to passing the 1852 compulsory education law: the craving to “Americanize” (Katz, 1976) tens of millions of European immigrants who were seeking employment; the effort to free millions of youth caught in an abusive system of working in the factories and mines; the tremendous dedication of labor unions to protecting adult labor and eliminating labor taken by children; and those who were influenced by utopian ideals, the Prussian example, and/or who wanted a subordinate workforce and an obedient civilian population. It is now important to examine what forces drove the influence of the continued development, expansion, and implementation of the mass education idea.

The 1852 law demanded that all children between the ages of eight and fourteen attend school for three months a year. This was unless these children could prove that they already had a handle of the material (Epstein, 2007), if they were participating in some other form of instruction that would result in a similar educational outcome, if they were physically or mentally incapable of attending, or if they lived in an extreme state of poverty. In that same year, a maximum incarceration of one year in a county jail was made the proper punishment for a truant child.

However, until about 1873, the compulsory schooling law was regarded as primarily a dead letter and unenforceable (Ensign, 1969). There were several reasons for this. The forces that influenced the adoption of the 1852 law were primarily political, including that of organized labor and philanthropy. Large quantities of the donated money came from the four major coal powers of the United States, and especially that of Rockefeller and Carnegie (Ensign, 1969), (Gatto, 2003). In addition, Horace Mann’s great influence had secured the support of many of Massachusetts’s political and economic leaders, and had convinced them of the “evils of non-attendance” (Ensign, 1969).

While the state’s elites may have been convinced, it did not seem as if the rest of the population was. Towns and cities were provided the ability to enforce truancy laws in 1850. This capacity was slightly strengthened in 1852, and even more so in 1859. Yet, these towns and urban centers did not take even modest steps towards using their new enforcement powers. Thus, in 1862, the law was amended so that it became mandatory for the towns and cities to “care for their delinquent children” (Ensign, 1969). However, the law still lacked any capability to coerce a community into enforcing the compulsory schooling requirements, and only seventy-seven out of three hundred-seventy five towns had completely addressed these obligations. Some pro-compulsory education forces grew increasingly frustrated, feeling as if Massachusetts was wasting years of precious time with the futile hope that towns and cities would respect the law without muscling them into it. As one educational report in favor of compulsory attendance laid out in 1969, “[Massachusetts thought] she might nurse her delinquent children and still more delinquent parents into voluntary conformity with her lofty ideals of education” (Ensign, 1969). On the bright side, these same believers argued, the continued attempts to put mass and forced schooling into action kept the subject alive and served as a method for convincing public and elite opinion. In addition, Massachusetts held great influence over some of the younger states, and its actions would help persuade them in adopting compulsory schooling laws (Ensign, 1969). The more states that used forced schooling, the easier it would be to impose in general. Regardless, compulsory schooling laws remained mostly unenforceable everywhere. An 1888-89 report by the United States Commissioner of Education chronicled one failure after another in implementing the new educational method. Another major factor was that in the early years of compulsory attendance, the states that had adopted this method had failed to develop an “administrative machinery,” reflective of the corporate and bureaucratic model, to enforce such laws (Katz, 1976).

This lack of enforcement due to an absence of any “administrative machinery” was only exemplified by the near impossibility of locating immigrant children in large cities. However, new measures continued to be implemented in the hopes of tracking down such evaders. These efforts were driven by the belief that, as one 1914 report from the Bureau of Education illustrated, the “welfare of the nation depends upon the control of illiteracy” (Deffenbaugh, 1914). Though thousands of immigrant children escaped attending school, and there were almost no records of their existence, the pro-compulsory agitators argued for a massive campaign to compile lists of all of them. With the access to such information, the school authorities – by way of aid from the police – would be able “enroll immediately all who belong under their control” (Deffenbaugh, 1914). As the demand for well-trained labor grew alongside an increasing population, more capital, effort, and support were allocated towards creating a functioning and effective bureaucratic machinery for enforcement (Katz, 1976).

Some of the earlier compulsory laws in different states excused children from lower socio-economic backgrounds. Though this was a relief to a number of immigrant families, many members of school committees and bureaus argued that it was necessary for the states to educate both the wealthy and poorer classes. Who was benefiting, these voices argued, if one class was getting educated while the other was not (Deffenbaugh, 1914)? While it is true that this concept has egalitarian overtones, the class dynamics of it are apparent. Those from wealthy backgrounds and neighborhoods were already able to impact their schools more and fit it to their ideals. Poorer neighborhoods and families, however, had access to less wealth and thus were not able to afford the same amount of influence over the schools that their children attended. The schools that were comprised of immigrants and poor children were more dependent on what the state supplied and ordered, increasingly subjecting them to the “good worker” attitudes of the compulsory schooling movement. Those from higher income backgrounds, however, were able to pay their way out of such situations. Parents who did not send their children to the schools were deemed selfish and regarded their children as nothing more than property.

Yet, it should be noted, that some measures were taken in select states to encourage children from poverty-stricken homes to attend school. Michigan, for example, paid some of the lost income to a family whose child left work for school. The Michigan measure allowed for “not more than $3 a week to be paid a family for one child, nor more than $6 a week for the children of any one family” (Deffenbaugh, 1914). Other states, including Massachusetts, decided to take a different approach to the situation and argued that if a child who was working in the factories or mines was not forced into the schools and given an education, they would always remain an “unskilled laborer” (Deffenbaugh, 1914). If this same child received an education, however, they would receive more earnings in the future and would raise the child out of the ranks from “a class verging upon pauperism” (Deffenbaugh, 1914). While this argument had merit, it came directly from those who were not dependent on their children’s income and thus could not realize the immediate pain and pinch that such a loss of wages would force. Much of the burden for truancy in the early days of compulsory schooling is often put on the children or the families from poorer backgrounds, but it should be recognized that other factors played into the continued lack of attendance. One such example of this is that, even with the new compulsion laws, some school authorities were not overtly enthusiastic in upholding this law – others were outright hostile. These authorities did not want the “poorly trained” and the “uncultured” children of the factories and mines in their “well-ordered” schools (Ensign, 1969).

Resistance and Enforcement

Except for the 1642 Massachusetts law, the family was largely the responsible body for the education of children in United States history. The family unit was regarded by many as not just a “principle of American democracy,” but also the bedrock of the population’s social organization. Thus, the new system’s goal of replacing the family with the State as the “primary parent” of the children met with resistance. This resistance was not only limited to avoiding compliance with compulsory attendance. Rebellions at schools, both by parents and students, took place – some examples include: the burning down of school houses, students locking teachers in building, or parents breaking in to free their children from being held after hours for detention (Gatto, 2003). Both the refusal to comply with the new system of mass schooling and the rebellions once at school were reflections of an immense resistance to an attempt to uproot and change the social order by an elite class. It was also defied by those parents that would have preferred their children to not work in the factories and mines, but who were dependent on their income to sustain a livelihood due to the poor wages they were paid in their own employment. The previously mentioned 1914 report from the Bureau of Education divides the stance against compulsory schooling into six distinct arguments: (1) although some crime is deterred through putting children in schools, a new societal crime is created; (2) it interferes with the liberty of parents; (3) new powers are arrogated by the government; (4) it is un-American and not adaptable to the country’s “free institutions,” (5) compulsory and forced schooling is monarchal in both its origins and history; and (6) school attendance is just as great without the law (Deffenbaugh, 1914).

The pro-compulsory responses to such arguments can be represented in an 1872 letter from B.G. Northop, the secretary of the Connecticut State Board of Education. In this letter, Northop attacked each individual point. In his argument, he claimed that compulsory schooling should create a new crime and that to bring up children in ignorance was a crime in itself. Northop asserted that all “modern civilizations” and legislations have created new crimes in order to address the otherwise barbaric world that lives on within societies. Each child put in a factory, Northop held, was a crime itself and could only be solved with the crime of compulsory schooling. As for the liberty of parents, it was his view that this autonomy ought to be violated. If parents couldn’t or wouldn’t provide the basic needs to their children, the government had the right to address such needs and become the new primary care-holder. “The child,” Northop wrote, “has rights which not even a parent may violate. He may not rob his child of the sacred right of a good education… When a parent is disqualified by intemperance, cruelty, insanity, society justly assumes control of the children.” The State would thus protect the “helpless,” who would otherwise become “vicious as well as weak” (Deffenbaugh, 1914). This argument, of course, implied that the income provided to families by child labor was for some personal gain of selfish parents – ignoring the realities of the economic strains put on immigrant and poor families by the new corporate state. Northop also dismissed the importance of new powers assumed by the state without a right to do so, claiming that all new laws have such results – including hygienic regulations. Ignorance, however, was just as “noxious as the most offensive nuisance,” and it was more “destructive than bodily contagious.” Thus, this arrogation of powers was an act of self-protection from the ignorance of the masses, and self- protection is a “fundamental law of society.” The freedoms that were restricted due to compulsory laws were pre-emptive measures. The secretary from Connecticut argued that if the child was not dragged by police to school if necessary, they would just be dragged to jail by the police a few years later. Northop also continued to make the case that it was the compulsory education laws that were responsible for awakening the original interest for public education, and therefore they should be protected in order to continue the teaching of the public in regards to the benefit of such a system (Deffenbaugh, 1914).

Yet, as the promotion and agitation for compulsory education persisted, the length of school years continued to expand (Althea & Woods, 2008). Alongside this growth, the bureaucratic machine for enforcing the adherence to such laws was strengthened and perfected by putting more power into the hands of the state (Ensign, 1969), and more and more children (including those who were child laborers and those who were not) were funneled into the system of mass schooling. The new corporate and industrial systems began to absorb increasing amounts of time from the parents, who worked long and difficult hours in the factories and the mines for little pay. As a result, the schools progressively began to fill the role of the family (Althea & Woods, 2008). Following this breakdown of the home and village life, and the industries that arose alongside the destruction, a new way of learning began to develop. This would come to take the place of the traditional learning processes – such as by the passing of chores and the apprenticeship system. As we will see shortly, this would allow those who held the financial control over the schools and educational system to create and maintain an army of workers to be trained in large scale production and the division of labor (Gatto, 2003).

Largely in part because of Horace Mann’s legacy and efforts, and his emphasis on the “evils of non-attendance and truancy” (Deffenbaugh, 1914), the 1852 law was passed in Massachusetts. But by 1900, thirty-two other states had implemented similar mass schooling laws. Finally, in 1918, Mississippi approved of a compulsory attendance law and all existing states implemented mass education. As in the 1914 Bureau of Education report, it is claimed by many that these laws, and especially in Massachusetts, were passed because “public sentiment” demand such measures (Deffenbaugh, 1914). Yet it is important to question such notions. What is meant here by “public sentiment”? The general population, immigrants, or those who had the resources and the necessary social prestige that was required for making ones voice heard and respected? The early laws were mostly records of failure and were regarded as dead letters (Deffenbaugh, 1914). If “public sentiment” had been so aroused in order to pass these laws, why was there a small record of volunteer obeying? Why did the school and state authorities find them so difficult to enforce? It seems extremely possible that this was because the “public sentiment” voiced was disproportionately represented by those of powerful elites and other dominant members of society. It is undeniable that the call for compulsory schooling also came from the labor unions of the time, but it appears that the masses of the nation as a whole did not choose to accept and comply with the law and the arguments behind them. The lack of the ability to enforce these laws was a direct result of disinterest and disagreement with their purposes by the majority of the population. Yet, those authorities and powers entrusted with the responsibility of enforcing the compulsory attendance laws were about to get a shot in the arm in the 1890’s from some of the most powerful individuals and groups in the nation.

The Industrialization of the Schools

Between the years of 1896 and 1920, a select and small collection of industrialists spent more money on mass and compulsory schooling than the entire government of the United States. These funds came through either philanthropic donations or their private charitable foundations. They also began to subsidize university chairs, university researches, and school administrators. As late as 1915, Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller were spending even more (Gatto, 2003). It was because of this that their voices and desires held more sway than that of any public. For an entire century, Prussia had served as a mirror to this group of powerful elites as to what the United States could become with discipline. This point was emphasized in 1871 when Prussia crushed France in a lightening war. Suddenly, the entire world’s attention snapped back onto this “hypnotic, utopian place” (Gatto, 2003). An obvious link became forged between the Prussian ways of government, the academic mind, and industry. Simultaneously, coal was making ordinary citizens both physically and socially more dangerous. Simple citizens could now travel great distances quickly with revolutionary ideas or rebel with the actual explosive power that was contained in coal. The Coal Age also furnished the rise of industries that depended on wars for economic growth. For a combination of all of these reasons, it was becoming even more imperative to have a workforce that was tame, dependable, and submissive (Gatto, 2003). The mass and forced system of schooling, which had worked wonders in Prussia, was a source of inspiration as to how this end goal could be reached. With the influx of immigrants, now concentrating from eastern and southern Europe, there was a continued loss of any sense of religious consensus in the nation. Business leaders recognized, as had the Prussians, that best way to shape a new social order would be with the use and manipulation of the growing power of the school systems. The compulsory schools were to undergo a massive and systematic restructuring process to reflect the needs of industrialization. It would be the steam and coal powers of the country that would provide the required funds necessary to establish and maintain such a colossal national system of elementary and forced schooling (Gatto, 2003).

As a disorganized population, immigrants and folks from impoverished backgrounds served as easy targets for this novel system of mass schooling (Gatto, 2003), (Althea & Woods, 2008). A 1912 essay, entitled “The Country School of Tomorrow,” composed by Rockefeller’s General Education Board stated this (as quoted in The Underground History of American Education):

We shall not try to make these people or any of their children into philosophers or men of learning or men of science. We have not to raise up from among them authors, educators, poets, or men of letters. We shall not search for embryo great artists, painters, musicians, nor lawyers, doctors, preachers, politicians, statesmen, of whom we have ample supply. The task we set before ourselves is a very simple as well as very beautiful one… we will organize our children… and teach them to do in a perfect way the things their fathers and mothers are doing in an imperfect way…

(Gatto, 2003, Page 174)

Prior to 1900, school boards were large in membership and functioned as clumsy organizations, but a seat was available to represent almost every interest. Following 1910, however, they were dominated by concentrated and small groups of businessmen, politicians, and lawyers. This business interest and involvement in elementary education was complimented by the fact that child labor had been deemed unnecessary by 1900 due to a rapid onset of mechanization in factories and mines. In addition, child labor was becoming deemed a detriment to business interests because it kept workers too unskilled, and did not allow them training in the art of obeying orders. In fact, by 1905, industrial corporations employed up to seventy-one percent of all wage earners in the United States and mining companies employed another ten percent (Gatto, 2003). Thus, one of the major shifts to mass education for mass production was to support a new mass population, whose offspring would enter the mass education system, and who would then be trained to work in this new mass production economy. It is here that we can see a self-supporting cycle of mass education for mass production.

This cycle, based on the industrialization of the country and the solidification of the compulsory schooling system, would depend on a new trend and direction: industrial education. This method of education intensely influenced later compulsory legislation in Massachusetts and elsewhere. The importance and stress that was put on this new method of education can be found in that previously mentioned report on education and child labor from 1969:

The industrial education of the twentieth century is but a part of a great social movement arising from the new philosophy of education which demands that every child be given opportunity to develop such abilities as he may potentially possess, to attain as nearly as possible his maximum capacity as a contributor in an economic and broadly social sense, not as an individualistic exploiter of the goods of life, but as a social unit whose welfare cannot be considered apart from that of society, and in whose limitations society must also suffer.

(Ensign, 1969, Page 74)

Children, then, were to be trained as good foot soldiers in the economy. This becomes evident in the industrialization of the schools.

In 1870, the Massachusetts legislature decided to insert drawing as a subject mandated to be taught in every school across the state. In towns and cities of over 10,000 individuals, instruction in both industrial and mechanical drawing skills were made obligatory. Industrial education continued to make grounds, and by 1884, training in manual labor was authorized by law. Then, in 1895, this became a requirement for high schools within cities that’s population exceeded 20,000. Three years later, this mandate was expanded to elementary schools. The trend continued, and in 1906, some form of the manual arts was a compulsory component in elementary courses of study. However, this was no longer restricted to the cities – but was expanded to the smaller towns as well.

Yet, something about the schools was still bothering the business interests. As the industrialization of the country continued, labor unions were rapidly gaining in strength against big businesses (Althea & Woods, 2008). The failed populist revolt of 1896 most likely fanned these fears, as industry leaders were becoming increasingly nervous by the strength of the ordinary worker (Gatto, 2003). Responding to these concerns, the senate and the Bureau of Education released several reports indicating that education was providing workers with too much power in the workplace. On top of this, workers were becoming too aware and discontent with the poor conditions that they lived and worked under. As a direct response, critical thinking classes were cut from curricula. These classes included philosophy and any other subject that raised questions about economics, justice, and society. The funding required to make such drastic changes in the schools possible were provided by none other than Rockefeller and Carnegie. Recreating a controlled-factory environment, bell systems were put in place throughout the schools. And even though it had been promised that schools would be even playing fields, were class backgrounds were of no importance, schools divided students into a system of levels – or “tracks.” This further emphasized the conditions that were characteristics of the factories and the mines. The working class children were most often kept in vocational and rudimentary classes. Children of wealthy backgrounds, however, were afforded more educational resources and independence. The worst and the fewest resources, however, were reserved for immigrants and children of color (Althea & Woods, 2008).

However, those whose voices were heard by the school systems remained dissatisfied with the direction industrial education was going. These influential bodies felt that there was too little power to enforce schools to follow the new industrial education laws and curricula. This was driven by the feeling that only a small number of children “destined to become industrial workers” were being trained in what the architects of the laws had “intended for them” (Ensign, 1969). For Massachusetts, if it were to maintain a status of industrial leadership, these laws would need to be respected. Thus, it was once again that the insistence for a new educational order came from business interests. In 1905, the Massachusetts Legislature commanded the governor to assign a commission to investigate the topics of technical and industrial education. Governor William L. Douglas, who was a successful manufacturer, designed a commission which compiled a wide-ranging study of industry, education, Massachusetts, and their relations. The 1969 educational report informs us about the conclusions reached by the commission:

After careful consideration of the entire industrial-educational situation the commission concluded that a radical modification in the school system was required. It was proposed that both instruction and practice in the elements of productive industry should have a place in elementary schools; that in the high schools, mathematics, the sciences, and drawing should be presented with particular reference to local industrial life.

(Ensign, 1969, pages 76-77)

It becomes evident that whatever egalitarian elements that were a part of the development of compulsory schooling laws had become completely overtaken by the interests of the economic elite, business leaders, and industrialists. Industry interests became the basis for the future advancement of schools. Indeed, the science, math, and drawing curricula of schools were adjusted by law to fit local industrial needs and wants. At this point, the synthesis of academic and industrial education became indivisible (Ensign, 1969).

William Torrey Harris served as the U.S. Commissioner of Education between the years of 1889 and 1906. Harris was one of the most prominent and influential educational figures of his time and was also a staunch supporter of compulsory schooling. Yet, the Commissioner also believed that children were property – and that the nation retains an undeniable right to use these children as it pleases. Mass and forced schooling, he held, would create a citizenry so reliant upon the State and the leaders that internal ruptures and revolutions would become a thing of the past (Gatto, 2003). This would seem to be a direct reference to the population in poverty, immigrants, and people of color. In his 1893 book, The Philosophy of Education, Harris had this to say,

Ninety-nine [students] out of a hundred are automata, careful to walk in prescribed paths, careful to follow the prescribed custom. This is not an accident but the result of substantial education, which, scientifically defined, is the subsumption of the individual…

He took this concept further:

The great purpose of school can be realized better in dark, airless, ugly places… It is to master the physical self, to transcend the beauty of nature. School should develop the power to withdraw from the external world.

(Gatto, 2003, pages 105-106)

Developed, effective, and well-funded bureaucracy was the reason that from 1900 to 1930, compulsory schooling laws were significantly strengthened in many states. These laws were no longer dead letters, but instead effective statutes (Katz, 1976). The materialization of efficient enforcement methods resulted in the success of a massive attempt at social control and manipulation. Mass schooling was transforming from just a legal standard into the normalized social order. On average, over one high school a day was opened in the years between 1890 and 1920 – this is a four hundred-sixty seven percent increase compared to the thirty years before (Katz, 1976).

The population of the United States exploded from 31 million to 91 million between 1860 and 1910, almost tripling over fifty years. Communities were experiencing a massive transformation from “simplicity” and “lack of differentiation” into metropolises of specialization, urbanization, and industrialization (Katz, 1976). This societal change was matched by a new influx of European immigrants from the southern and eastern countries of the region. Normalized citizens and the powerful elite were becoming increasingly fearful of “crime,” “vagrancy,” and a class of foreign-speaking “paupers”. Schools were promoted as agents and tools of assimilation and social control for this intimidating, new society (Katz, 1976). While the concept of schools as a means of social control was nothing new, its popularity thrived as the concentration of immigrants exploded in the cities (Katz, 1976).

Conclusions and Implications

As we have seen, the development of mass education in the United States coincided directly with both industry’s need for good, obedient workers and a demand for social control by powerful business interests and citizenry. Yet, the initial introduction of compulsory schooling was a result of a multitude of factors – both egalitarian, nefarious, and everywhere in between. Even many of those who were attempting to implement forced schooling as a means of social control were legitimately working to eliminate the wretched conditions of such things as child labor. Every force, from the labor unions to the utopian idealists, believed that they were in one way or another doing what was best for society. These different visions and intentions, including all that were for and against compulsory schooling, would participate in the introduction of compulsory schooling in the 1852 law of Massachusetts. However, with this implementation, the powerful business interests and elite citizenry would be the ones to influence and direct what goals schools would strive for and the methods they would use for execution. Although the methods of the 1852 law were different, it would end up having an equivalent aim as the 1642 colonial law: cultural, social, and economic control over society. Thus, if the intention was to have a national workforce, the country would need a national and standardized education. The forced, regulated, and controlled distribution of knowledge served as a means of manipulation. The control over knowledge equaled the control over workers. Powerful and influential societal powers, such as Rockefeller and Carnegie, made sure that the means of mass education for production was actually a method of mass producing good workers and good nationalists. It is not unheard of, nor uncommon, for movements in the United States that have egalitarian intentions to be absorbed by those in power for their own interests, as did happen with compulsory schooling.

However, it is important to reject two arguments that generally accompany the critical analysis of the origins of compulsory education in the United States. The first is that the system of learning prior to compulsory schooling, through working and apprenticeship, is the model that we should return to. Such an argument ignores the truth of the difficulties that persisted, especially amongst children from impoverished backgrounds and children of color. In fact, the concept of mass education or education available to everyone is not inherently a bad one – but it is when the educational system is not equitable, and is used to enforce class systems and other forms of oppression, that we run into problems. Education that is used as a means for the collective and individual good, not for social control and the maintenance of power structures, and that allow for individual choice in participation, is essential for moving towards a more just society. Additionally, it is important to realize that if we were to suddenly abolish the system of education that we have in place now – children could once again be taken advantage of and used as instruments to grow individual elite’s wealth. In fact, it is irresponsible to deny that child labor has completely been abolished. Instead, it has just taken on a more invisible role to the larger society. Most child laborers who are being exploited today are from countries south of the United States border and work in agriculture. However, the difficulties that they face are extremely similar to the ones faced by immigrants of the late 18^th and early 19^th century: if they leave work and enter school, their families will be unable to sustain a living; and if they do not acquire some form of education, they will most likely remain in poverty. Such a social crisis must be faced with a three-pronged attack: first, the exploitative child labor must be abolished; second, families must receive just, fair, and more than complete compensation that they would lose because of this; and third, individuals must have their liberty respected in order to learn freely.

Finally, one last question should be posed. If mass education for mass production was so effective, shouldn’t that serve as a lesson for those of us interested in promoting alternative economics? Would it not follow that the best way to promote cooperative and democratic work would be through cooperative education? Forced schooling that followed the model of industrial work was the most successful tool used for creating a workforce prepared to toil under the conditions set by the wealthy business interests. If we are to take any lesson from this, it should be that the form of education a society of children experience will prepare them for a specific form of work. Cooperative, democratic, and equitable education are thus essential prerequisites for a culture of humanized work.

Bibliography

Anderson, James D. The Education of Blacks in the South, 1860- 1935. New York: University of North Carolina P, 1988.

Althea, Amina, and Amber Woods. “A History of Compulsory Schooling.” I Want To Do This All Day. Internet Archive. 14 Aug. 2008 <http://www.archive.org>.

Coleman, J. S., et al. (1966). Equality of Educational Opportunity. Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office.

Deffenbaugh, W.S. “Compulsory Attendance Laws in the United States.” United States Bureau of Education. Washington, D.C.: Washington Government Printing Office, 1914. 7-56.

Ensign, Forest C. Compulsory School Attendance and Child Labor. New York, NY: Arno P & The New York Times, 1969.

Epstein, R. (2007). “Let’s abolish high school”. Education Week. Retrieved April 18, 2007, from www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2007/04/04/31epstein.h26.html

Gatto, J. T. (2003). The Underground History of American Education. New York: The Oxford Village Press.

Gutman, Herbert G. Work, Culture, and Society in Industrializing America. New York, NY: AlfredA. Knopf, Inc, 1976. 3-78.

Katz, Michael S. “A History of Compulsory Education Laws.” Fastback Series (1976): 1-39.

Kendrick, Stephen, and Paul Kendrick. Sarah’s Long Walk : The Free Blacks of Boston and How Their Struggle for Equality Changed America. New York: Beacon P, 2006.

Langhout, R.D. (2005). “Acts of Resistance: Student (In)Visibility”. Culture and Psychology, 11, 123-158

O’Keeffe, D. (2004). Libertarian Alliance. “Compulsory education: An oxymoron of modernity”. Retrieved September 10, 2007, from http://www.libertarian.co.uk/lapubs/educn/educn036.htm

Rothbard, M. (1978). “Public and compulsory schooling”. In For a New Liberty (chap. 7). Retrieved September 10, 2008, from http://www.mises.org/rothbard/newliberty6.asp

That’s right, you can read The Underground History of American Education in its entirety online – and for free! Just go here. While I don’t agree with everything in the book, it’s definitely an important social critique and historical interpretation about schools in the United States. It is certainly worth checking out.

I think it’s really important when books, especially ones that are not of the mainstream, do this and make their work and knowledge available to everyone and for free. (Plus, it’s just a good way to promote a book.) So, kudos to Gatto for that.

Hey readers,

So, I know I said I was going to blog about each day at Mondragón. However, unfortunately, my first night there my computer’s hard-drive collapsed and I lost everything on it. Needless to say, I didn’t really have access to the internet often – and I was kind of preoccupied with dealing with that crisis. I’m sorry for that, though.

Regardless, Mondragón was an amazing and a life-altering experience. Because I was not able to post about it nightly, I’m going to write one large report back and discussion of the Mondragón, education, and worker-cooperative experience – and the links Mondragón draws between workplace-democracy and learning place-democracy.

Additionally, I’m going to be doing something a little different with this blog from here on out: instead of posting small-posts on a regular basis, I’m going to begin writing much longer and more in-depth ones with more time in between their submission. While this means that there will be less activity on this blog, it also means that there will be much more content in each discussion. However, I will still be posting other occasional short discussions and learning-tools and activities in between.

Now, this leads me to the question: are you interested in having something posted at or writing something for the Adventures in Free Schooling blog? It can be about anything you please: a discussion, an argument, a history, a workshop, a curriculum, a personal story, and etc. I’d love to expand this site beyond primarily my voice. If you are interested, send an e-mail to: brian AT freeschooling DOT org – and let me know.

And to hold you over for now, here is a quote from Don José María Arizmendiarrieta, founder of the Mondragón cooperative experience:

Knowledge is power.

Knowledge must be socialized so that power can be democratized.

After the socialization of culture, inevitably follows the socialization of wealth and even of power. We may say that this is the indispensable and prior condition for the democratization and socioeconomic progress of a people.

UPDATE: You can now read my report on the Mondragón Cooperative educational experience here.

On September 27th, I will fly from New York to Bilbao, Spain. The purpose of this trip will be to participate in a program run by the Praxis Peace institute to learn about the Mondragón Cooperative Corporation. Specifically, I will be looking at how Mondragón functions democratically and as a worker cooperative, its relation to and involvement with education, and how themes of Mondragón could be related back to the learning-place democracy movement here in the United States.

What is a Worker Cooperative? What is Mondragón?

According to the International Co-operative Alliance, a cooperative is “an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social, and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly-owned and democratically-controlled enterprise.” There are many different types of cooperatives, but in the United States two of the most common types are worker cooperatives and consumer cooperatives. Consumer cooperatives are businesses that are owned by the customers for the customers’ mutual benefit. Worker cooperatives, on the other hand, are cooperatives that are owned and democratically run completely by its employees. Thus, the workers are also the owners (worker-owners).

Mondragón is one of the largest and most successful worker cooperatives of all time. It has existed since roughly 1956, created in the Basque region of Spain during Fascist rule, and has only continued to grow since. While many other parts of Spain and its Basque region faced economic turmoil during and after Franco’s rule (1939-1975), Mondragón continued to prosper and exist as a democratic workplace in a fascist state. There are many reasons (while some are still being debated) for Mondragón’s success.

One particular aspect that the Mondragón experiment has been noted for is the fact that it is one large worker cooperative corporation that is made up of many smaller worker cooperatives. Each cooperative is its own individual entity while being connected through a cooperative bank (the Caja Laboral Popular), a Cooperative Congress, and other economic ties. This means that the worker-cooperatives that comprise Mondragón are both autonomous and cooperative: much like the individual worker-owners.

Education in Mondragón

Mondragón actively acknowledges the importance of education in a successful democratic workplace. A good education (one that is always continuing) is seen as the center of making workplace democracy a reality. From its origins, Mondragón has been linked with education and schools. The cooperative system was born out of a training school organized for industrial apprentices. José María Arizmendiarrieta, one of the main thinkers behind the origins of Mondragón (and the founder of the training school), wrote, “It has been said that cooperativism is an economic movement that uses education; we can also alter the definition, affirming that it is an educational movement that uses economic action.”

The Mondragón experiment already engages the education aspect of workplace democracy in many ways.  Mondragón contains cooperative schools and universities. On top of that, it employs programs that are designed to keep consumers and worker-owners educated. Additionally, some cooperatives are research cooperatives with the purpose of doing discovery work for other Mondragón co-ops. These are just to name a few.

What I Hope To Discover

The bold and thought-provoking history of Mondragón thoroughly ties together workplace democracy to the importance of education that prepares workers for cooperation and self-management. However, on this trip, I will hope to examine three things: 1) What connections can we draw between workplace democracy and learning-place democracy? 2) Is the education movement promoted by Mondragón also democratic? 3) How can the lessons of Mondragón, autonomy and cooperation, be tied together with the radical learning movement here in the United States?

1) If the Mondragón philosophy is that education is the central key to making workplace democracy successful, is it not true that learning and places of learning should also be democratic? What, then, are the connections between workplace democracy and learning-place democracy? In what ways are they dependent on one other?

2) We should not get lost in romanticizing Mondragón. While it is an impressive and important example in workplace democracy, it is true that it has existing problems and stains on its history. What I will attempt to find out on this trip is whether or not Mondragón promotes autonomy and cooperation in its school and educational philosophies as it does in its workplace. While the Mondragón educational programs are innovative in their own right, how do they tie together workplace democracy and learning-place democracy? How are they successful in this and how are they not?

3) Lastly, I hope to explore how the lessons of the Mondragón cooperative – the autonomy of individual worker co-ops with cooperation on a larger scale with other co-ops – could be implemented (and the importance of doing so) here in the United States with radical learning projects and centers. While there exist many experiments in radical education, they are for the most part autonomous without working cooperatively with other projects. Will they go the way of many worker cooperatives in the United States and disappear because there is no system of mutual support? Or can we take a lesson from Mondragón and find ways to be independent communities while working cooperatively for common goals?

The following is a learning activity I crafted for a class I was teaching on U.S. History. It was designed for teenagers, but I think it could be easily adapted for slightly-younger folks and adults.

Download it in PDF form here.

Activity: Underrepresented Peoples in U.S. History

• Goal of this activity: For the students to engage United States history by discovering what peoples go underrepresented in traditional tales of U.S. history. They will do this by interviewing community members, their peers, and themselves. This is both an individual and (can be a) group effort.
• Materials Needed: Community members to investigate, pens/pencil, paper. Optional: Note cards.
• Participants: 1-20 (or more, depending on your needs/ability).
• Time Needed: 45 – 90 minutes.

1. First, designate a community of people to interview: i.e. a school, a downtown, a class, a library, or etc. Give the following questions/guidelines to the participants (recommended on a piece of paper):

Who were important [your group] in American history? How did they impact the world that we know today? What lessons can we learn from them? (REMEMBER: important people don’t have to mean good people)

Go ask people in the area if they can identify any of the following groups of people in American history and ask them the questions specified above (and any other questions you think are important). Record their answers and think about why they gave the answers they did.

The students will fill in the [your group] bracket with one of the following possibilities:

• People of color
• Women
• Women of color
• Gender queer folks
• Lower-class folks
• Differently-Abled folks
• People of non-Christian faiths
• Immigrants
• Political dissenters
• [Add more that you see fit]

(You might want to lay these different options out on a table on note-cards for the students to choose from.)

2. Send the students out to engage with the designated community. A recommend time is anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour. Depending on the needs of your class and your area, you may want to travel around with the students to help them find individuals to engage and help in facilitation.

3. After a sufficient amount of time, call the participants back. Amount a discussion as to whom they investigated and the answers they received. Here is a list of some recommended follow-up questions:

• Was it easy or difficult for people to think of individuals who have contributed to American History from your groups?
• Why do you think this is the case?
• Regarding African-Americans, is your list of individuals solely those who fought against slavery and in the Civil Rights movement? Why might this be?
• Did you notice any patterns in people given to you in your interviews?
• Who would you say still goes excluded from this list?
• In what ways do you think the influence these groups of people have had over the history of the United States has gone ignored or silenced?
• What are possible ways that we could attempt to change this?
• [More that you wish to include or that the participants inspire]
• Ask the students if they have any questions or comments to explore.

(Optional: Before starting the discussion, ask the students to interview each other with their specified groups. Also a good alternative if you don’t have a community available to access for this activity).

4. An Optional Follow Up:

Say to the class/participants: I’m going to recommend something for you to try after this class if you’d like to do something to follow up this activity and engage the subject matter further.

Pose this question to the students (on pieces of paper or etc.)

Choose a certain part of yourself, your whole identity, or some parts. By “identity,” I mean any way that you personally view yourself. If you can, talk to people with similar self-representations and ask them about how they think their image has been portrayed or represented in United States history. How well represented are you in traditional tales of U.S. history? In what ways is this identity talked about? What are some representations that you don’t associate with? How often and in what ways do you feel these identities have been portrayed in United States history? Do you believe these portrayals of different identities are fair?