-
The 10th amendment states that "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people." In effect, this led to schools being run by individual states instead of the federal government.
-
Horace Mann leads the charge for the first public schools in the nation and helps to establish the first school board in Massachusetts.
-
The supreme court upholds a Louisiana law that required segregated cars on public transportation. This set up the legal precedence of "Separate but Equal". States used this to segregate schools and discriminate between the races.
-
In 1954 the Supreme Court struck down the "separate but equal" doctrine based on the equal protections clause of the 14th amendment saying that "Segregated schools are inherently unequal." The ruling did not specify how desegregation should work. A decade later, 98% of black students were still in segregated schools.
-
The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) was a cornerstone of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s “War on Poverty” (McLaughlin, 1975). ESEA has been amended and reinstituted many times since then, but essentially it is designed to help schools with low income students.
-
Title IX is an amendment to a federal law ensuring that educational institutions that receive federal funds do not discriminate on the basis of sex. This has shaped the way that many schools, both K-12 and public universities, handle things like enrollment, participation, and funding for athletics.
-
The Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA) was signed into law in 1975. The main effect was that all students, and especially students with disabilities, had access to a free and public education in the least restrictive environment for that student.
-
While the internet age arguably started over a decade before google was invented, this company has long been the symbol for easy internet access. Before google learning often focused on rote memorization of facts. More and more educators are learning that, with this technology readily available, digital citizenship and lifelong learning are more important than teaching students facts and figures.
-
The No Child Left Behind act was a controversial federal law whose goal was to level the playing field for all students by holding schools accountable through high stakes testing. If a school didn't meet the yearly goal (AYP) then the state could remove the school leadership or even close the school, and parents could move their children to another school if they desired.
