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Schoolchildren writing on a chalkboard.
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The New Tax Law Poses a Hidden Threat to American Democracy

Undermining public education will exacerbate polarization and mistrust.
by Johann N. Neem, Tony Tian-Ren Lin via Made By History on January 8, 2018
First grade teacher instructing Spanish pronunciation in Texas.
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Helping Latino Kids Succeed in the Classroom Doesn’t Have to be an Ideological War

Conservatives backed bilingual education until it became a progressive cause.
by Natalia Mehlman Petrzela via Made By History on September 21, 2017
Demonstrators protesting new history curriculum
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How The Culture Wars Destroyed Public Education

The left's Pyrrhic victory in the culture wars.
by Andrew Hartman via Made By History on September 5, 2017
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The Founding Fathers Made Our Schools Public. We Should Keep Them That Way.

They believed public schools were the foundation of a virtuous republic.
by Johann N. Neem via Made By History on August 20, 2017
Exhibit

Public Education

From the politics of access and funding to the craft of teaching, debates about education have always boiled down to one fundamental question: What – and who – are public schools for?

Why Do Schoolhouses Matter?

The rise of public education in America.
by Johann N. Neem via Public Seminar on July 20, 2017
Eve Ewing, and the cover of her book "Original Sins."

How Do We Combat the Racist History of Public Education?

On the schoolhouse’s role in enforcing racial hierarchy.
by Naomi Elias, Eve L. Ewing via The Nation on March 4, 2025
Erased chalkboard in empty classroom

Cruel to Your School

Public education is meant to be a great equalizer. That’s why Trump wants to do undo it.
by Jennifer C. Berkshire via The Baffler on February 27, 2025
Ronald Reagan standing before a podium and a row of American flags.

The Rise of Ronald Reagan, a Product of California

On the early career of the actor-cum-politician who changed America.
by Michael Hiltzik via Literary Hub on February 26, 2025
Print depicting a teacher and students at a freedmen's school in Vicksburg.

Why America’s First Department of Education Didn’t Last

Created in 1867, the short-lived office was mired in the ongoing American strife after the Civil War.
by Petula Dvorak via Retropolis on February 4, 2025
Gov. Ronald Reagan confronted student protesters in Sacramento weeks before dismissing “intellectual luxuries.”

The Day the Purpose of College Changed

After February 28, 1967, the main reason to go was to get a job.
by Dan Berrett via The Chronicle of Higher Education on January 26, 2025
The gym and auditorium at Schenley High School in Pittsburgh, built just before the school closed in 2008.

What Abandoned Schools Can Teach Us

Empty chairs, empty tables, and the dismantling of the American Dream.
by Matthew Christopher via Atlas Obscura on September 13, 2024
A row of colorful houses in New Orleans.

A Forgotten or Simply Erased History of Organized Labor

After Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans replaced all its public schools with charter schools. A new book recovers the decades of work the storm disrupted.
by Daniel G. Cumming via The Metropole on July 22, 2024
Black student looking up at a school bus full of white children.

The Boston ‘Busing Crisis’ Was Never About Busing

Five decades after the desegregation effort, a civil-rights scholar questions its framing.
by Jeanne Theoharis via The Emancipator on June 19, 2024
Map of school segregation in the U.S. in 2024.

This Map Lets You See How School Segregation Has Changed in Your Hometown

The new interactive tool accompanies a study of school enrollment data, which shows that segregation has worsened in recent decades.
by Sarah Kuta via Smithsonian on May 17, 2024
Students in Winnetka, Ill., are checked by a nurses as shown here on return to school following illness. 1947.
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To Address the Teen Mental Health Crisis, Look to School Nurses

For more than a century, school nurses have improved public health in schools and beyond.
by Sherrie Page Guyer via Made By History on May 8, 2024
Blue-print style sketch of a suburban home, with sidewalk, driveway, and garage

How the Suburbs Became a Trap

Neighborhoods that once promised prosperity now offer crumbling infrastructure, aged housing stock, and social animus.
by Caitlin Zaloom via The New Republic on April 18, 2024
Sign on fence reading "This is a D.A.R.E. drug free school zone."

D.A.R.E. Is More Than Just Antidrug Education—It Is Police Propaganda

DARE lost its once hegemonic influence over drug education, but it had long-lasting effects on American policing, politics, and culture.
by Max Felker-Kantor via Public Books on April 17, 2024
Book cover of Counterrevolution by Melinda Cooper.

A Tax Haven in a Heartless World: On Melinda Cooper’s “Counterrevolution”

Why should taxpayers fund schools that violate their own values, the Moms for Liberty wonder? A new book traces how this kind of thinking about public spending came to be.
by Sarah Brouillette via Los Angeles Review of Books on April 15, 2024
From left: schoolchildren, their teacher, and Nancy Reagan look on as a police officer talks about the DARE program

The Kids Who Snitched on Their Families Because DARE Told Them To

The program was about education. But it was also about surveillance.
by Max Felker-Kantor via Slate on September 30, 2023
John Birch Society book store.

A Mid-Century Playbook for Saving Progressive American Education

Fifty years ago, parents united to get the far-right John Birch Society out of their schools.
by Matthew Dallek via Zócalo Public Square on September 19, 2023
Freedpeople sit at Foller’s House in Cumberland Landing, Va., 1862.

If “Woke” Dies, Our Nation’s Truths Die with It

Ron DeSantis wants to retrofit history to conform to conservative ideology.
by Tera W. Hunter via Hammer & Hope on August 30, 2023
Members of Moms for Liberty stand outside a school, one holding a sign reading "I don't co-parent with the government."

Moms for Liberty Is Riding High. It Should Beware What Comes Next.

Yelling about schools gets people riled up. The outcome can be unpredictable.
by Adam Laats via Slate on August 29, 2023
Cliff Joseph's art, Blackboard, 1969. One adult and one young Black person stand in front of a blackboard.

The Long War on Black Studies

It would be a mistake to think of the current wave of attacks on “critical race theory” as a culture war. This is a political battle.
by Robin D. G. Kelley via New York Review of Books on June 17, 2023
Linda Brown Smith, Ethel Louise Belton Brown, Harry Briggs, Jr., and Spottswood Bolling, Jr., 1964

Brown v. Board of Education: Annotated

The 1954 Supreme Court decision, based on the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, declared that “separate but equal” has no place in education.
by Liz Tracey via JSTOR Daily on May 17, 2023
Nine yearbook photos, including Langston Hughes'.

Class Production

A collection of high school yearbooks from Cleveland captures the rise, fall, and uncertain future of the American middle class.
by Alex Houston via JSTOR Daily on May 15, 2023
Collage of Hungerford School in Eatonville.

A Florida Town, Once Settled By Former Slaves, Now Fights Over "Sacred Land"

In Eatonville, one of the few Black towns to have survived incorporation, locals are fighting to preserve 100 acres of land from being sold to developers.
by Martha Teichner via CBS News on March 19, 2023
1961 pamphlet for Florida's "Americanism vs. Communism" course.

The Long History of Conservative Indoctrination in Florida Schools

The top educational priorities in the Sunshine State were apparently reading, writing, and anti-communism.
by Tera W. Hunter via The Nation on February 27, 2023
Two African American boys working in the Freedom Press Office in Hattiesburg, Mississippi in July 1964.

Florida’s Stop Woke Act is Latest in a Long History of Censoring Black Scholarship

America has been declaring war on Black education since this country’s beginnings. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ Stop Woke Act seeks to continue this tradition.
by Darryl Robertson via Andscape on February 23, 2023
Illustration of the Supreme Court and a school house mirroring each other. The Supreme Court sits atop a dollar bill, and the school house is upside down on the other side of the bill.

The Racist Idea that Changed American Education

How a landmark Supreme Court decision was shaped by the racist idea that poor children can’t learn.
by Matt Barnum via Vox on February 13, 2023
W.E.B. DuBois.

W.E.B. Du Bois, Black History Month and the Importance of African American Studies

As the 20th century’s preeminent scholar-activist on race, W.E.B. Du Bois would not be surprised by modern-day attempts at whitewashing American history.
by Chad Williams via The Conversation on February 7, 2023
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