The history of education must contain a balance between interpretation of the school itself and the school in its broader social and political context. Such a balance would be a constructive relief fromearlier revisionist theory viewing American schooling as mis-education or as a minor player next to other socializing and educating institutions.…

In the last fifteen years revisionists have attacked the ascendency of Ellwood P. Cubberly, and his pietistic picture of the public school, with historical perspectives that relegate public education to being one of many educational functions in American culture and with the view that public schools "miseducate" the American people.…