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When quoting material from this collection, the preferred citation is: University of Chicago. College of Education. Records, [Box #, Folder #], Hanna Holborn Gray Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library
The study of education at the University of Chicago began in 1895 with the organization of the Department of Pedagogy under head professor John Dewey. The Department offered methodological courses on academic subjects and theoretical seminars on the philosophy, science, and ethics of pedagogical practice. In 1896, a University Elementary School was established within the Department to serve as a workshop for classroom observation and the testing of educational method; known as the Dewey School or the Laboratory School, it attracted national attention and supported Dewey's growing reputation among progressive educators.
In 1901, the University created the School of Education through the acquisition and consolidation of three independent Chicago institutions. Two local secondary schools, the Chicago Manual Training School and the South Side Academy, were merged to form the University High School. The Chicago Institute, a private teachers' college founded by Anita McCormick Blaine in 1899, was incorporated as the College of Education. The Institute's elementary school, after a brief period of autonomy as the University Elementary School on the Blaine Foundation, was amalgamated with the University Elementary School and the University Kindergarten. Colonel Francis W. Parker, a veteran educational reformer and head of the Chicago Institute, was installed as Director of the School of Education, and his prot
The records of the College of Education are divided into three series: administrative records of the College from 1901 to 1925; correspondence of the Dean's office from 1900 to 1926; and records of Phi Delta Kappa Fraternity from 1921 to 1924.
Series I: Administrative Records, includes minutes of the College from its inception to dissolution and financial records from 1901 to 1910. The weekly reports to the Dean and student health reports represent a larger body of similar records in the College files discarded when the present collection was organized.
Series II: Correspondence of the Dean's Office represents two periods in the management of the Dean's files. Most surviving letters from 1901-1915 concerned individual students and requests for College publications. Samples of these letters and all correspondence relating to faculty or administrators have been retained. Included are seventeen routine letters of John Dewey; letters of recommendation from Jenkin Lloyd Jones, Graham Taylor, and Sophonisba Breckinridge, among others; and requests from schools for student's with particular racial or religious backgrounds for teaching positions.
Beginning in 1915, all correspondence in the Dean's office was filed alphabetically by school year; reduced by the removal of most student letters, this second group of correspondence is complete through 1926 except for 1924-25 and part of 1923-24. Most of the correspondence was generated by William S. Gray, Assistant Dean and acting head of the College beginning July 1, 1916, and Dean from July 1, 1917 onward. Gray corresponded regularly with administrators Charles H. Judd and Nathaniel Butler, and with faculty members Katherine Blunt, Franklin Bobbitt, Frederick Breed, Guy Buswell, Frank Freeman, Rolla Lyman, Samuel Chester Parker, William Reavis, Walter Sargent, Alice Temple, and Rollo Tryon. Work in Rochester and Toledo supporting Gray's research in reading prompted lengthy exchanges with E. Helen MacLachlan, Joseph P. O'Hearn, and Estaline Wilson. Developments in educational testing were monitored through correspondence with B. R. Buckingham and Walter S. Monroe of the University of Illinois, C. T. Gray of the University of Texas, and L. A. Pechstein of the University of Rochester. Other Gray interests reflected in the letters include the operation of local school systems (George N. Cade); support for religious education (Walter S. Athearn); and the strengthening of educational professionalism (National Education Association).
Series III: Phi Delta Kappa Records, 1921-1924.Phi Delta Kappa was founded in 1910 as a national professional fraternity committed to scientific pedagogy. Membership was limited to white male graduate and undergraduate students chosen by secret ballot; graduates of two-year normal schools were barred unless they subsequently matriculated at a school of education associated with a university. These records were accumulated during Gray's term as president of the organization and deal with such matters as affiliation with American Association for the Advancement of Science (34:1) and attempts to control the growth of rival educational fraternities (35:4).