Ante-bellum and

Reconstruction Eras:

Gender, Race and the Curriculum

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Oberlin’s co-ed walk (parallel walkways) W.E.B. DuBois

John Russworm

Shifts at the End of the National Era

• Fewer grads entered public service• Rise of popular democracy (Jacksonian

democracy)• Traditional curriculum v. practical curriculum• Rise of nonsectarian university• Rise of higher education shifts from building

moral character to career advancement• Development of the ‘collegiate way of life’

Women and Education

• Creation of public school system impacts their higher education (normal schools)

• Troy Female Seminary; Oberlin, 1833; and Mount Holyoke

• Seneca Falls Women’s Rights Convention• Vassar, 1861; Wellesley, 1870; Spelman,

1881• Widespread fears of ‘harming’ white women

with too much education

The Progressive Era

• Classical curriculum considered outdated

• Instead, students need practical education and differentiated education

• Rise of electives

Black Higher Education

• Political context• Ideological context• Development of HBCUs

– Differences between public and private– 2,132 enrolled in 1917; 13,580 enrolled in 1927

• Debate over the place of Blacks in American society

Questions for Discussion• What do you make of the Yale Report and its defense

of the liberal arts? What is/should be the role of professional training in undergraduate studies? When should students be able to specialize?

• How much differentiation in education is too much? How do black colleges and women’s colleges fit here?

• What do all undergraduates need to know? • What do you make of the role of funding/philanthropy

in directing the path of higher learning?