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ENGLAND 7916033 TAGER» FLORENCE MARCIA SUSKER A RADICAL APPROACH TO EDUCATIONS ANARCHIST SCHOOLING— THE MODERN SCHOOL OF NEW YORK AND 5 T E L T O N - THE DH10 STATE UNIVERSITY, PH.D., 1 9 7 9 University M icro film s International oon3 ziebhoau , ann ahboo. mi48ioe © 1979 FLORENCE MARCIA SUSKER TAGER ALL RIGHTS RESERVED A RADICAL APPROACH TO EDUCATION: ANARCHIST SCHOOLING— THE MODERN SCHOOL OF NEW YORK AND STELTON DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of the Ohio State University By Florence Tager, B.A. , M.A. ***** The Ohio State University 1979 Reading Committee: Approved By Dr. Bernard Mehl Dr. Paul Klohr Dr. Robert Jewett Adviser Department of Educational Foundations and Research To David and Miriam Whose childhood play surrounded this work, sparking the creative force behind it ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS A great deal of encouragement, challenge, friendship, criticism, support and hard work have gone into developing the ideas of this work. Much of this support has come from friends, colleagues, teachers and librarians. To these individuals I wi3h to show my appreciation. First and foremost I wish to thank Dr. Bernard Mehl, my major adviser and the chairperson of this doctoral committee. In the Hebraic tradition of the rabbi-teacher, he rigorously questioned my ideas and the moral values implicit in these ideas, while at the same time forcing me to confront myself through my writing. Without his presence this dissertation could not have taken its present form. I also wish to thank the members of my doctoral committee: Dr. Klohr, for his patient, warm encouragement in times of crisis, and Dr. Jewett, for his comments and suggestions. In addition, several friends and colleagues from various parts of the country have made helpful suggestions and criticisms. I wish to thank David Rosen, Dr. TomMitchell, and Lorraine Cohen for the endless hours spent discussing the major themes of this work. I also wish to thank Dr. Mary Young, Dr. Mark Fishman, Pam Fishman, Susan Wolfe, Linda Marks and Eve Maged for the time spent reading and criticizing each chapter of this work. In addition, I wish to thank Donald Sinclair, curator of Special Collections at Rutgers University Library, and his staff for accommodating service and patience with which they provided iii materials and suggested further sources. I also wish to thank Fran Richetti for her careful editing and proofreading, and Anne Goldstein for her patient work in typing this dissertation. Last but not least I wish to thank my parents whose lives as immigrants on the Lower East Side of New York and whose strong sense of social justice sparked my interest in this subject. Their generous financial assistance made the writing of this dissertation possible. iv VITA December 17, 1936 ........ Born— Brooklyn, New York 1957 ..................... B.A., Brooklyn College Brooklyn, New York 1970 ..................... M.A., Ohio State University Columbus, Ohio M.A. thesis— "Alienation in the Schools: Two Alternatives— The Kibbutz and Summerhill" 1973-1979 ................. Instructor, Department of Education, Medgar Evers College, The City University of New York, Brooklyn, New York FIELDS OF STUDY Educational Foundations and Research. Drs. Bernard Mehl and Paul Klohr Educational Humanities. Dr. Robert Jewett TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.............................................. iii VITA ........................................................ v Chapter I. TOWARD AN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE ON RADICAL EDUCATION IN THE U.S........................ 1 II. THE ANARCHIST TRADITION IN THEORY AND PRACTICE .... 31 III. ANARCHIST EDUCATIONAL THEORY .......................... 80 IV. ANARCHIST SCHOOLING: THE MODERN SCHOOL AND THE FERRER ASSOCIATION IN NEW Y O R K ............ 133 The New York Years: The Ferrer Association .... 141 The New York Years: The Modern S c h o o l . 160 V. ANARCHIST SCHOOLING: THE MODERN SCHOOL AT STELTON . 200 VI. CONCLUSION: WHERE HAVE ALL THE CHILDREN GONE? .... 285 BIBLIOGRAPHY ................................................ 306 vi CHAPTER I TOWARD AN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE ON RADICAL EDUCATION IN THE U.S. Suppose we reject the ideal of the good life as determined by the dominant values of a culture and suppose we reject the worth of continuing this culture, its form, its established roles, its dominant conceptions of pleasure, achievement, integrity. To simply say that we want to prepare young people to make their own decisions later, doesn’t solve much, it mainly expresses our sense of being at a loss to conceive the continuity of social existence and the values clearly enough to provide content to the idea of transmitting a world to the young. On one level, Paul Goodman’s statement implies that the forms of self expression characteristically attributed to radical educators like A. S. Neill and to cultural forms embodied in the counter culture of the sixties lacked a defined historic connection to the past: lacked a commitment to an ideal, a belief or value system other than a nebulous notion of freedom defined in terms of self expression, vitality or elan vital. On another level Goodman’s statement suggests concern with the ways in which schools connect to history, a process both social and personal, that seeks to transform society. Goodman's concerns are historical concerns, voiced by both philosophers and social theorists since time immemorial. They are visible in all utopian writings from Plato’s Republic to Bellamy's ■^Allan Graubard, Free the Children (New York: Vintage Books, 1974), p. 272. 1 2 Looking Backward, to Skinner's Walden II. Both educating the young to a new consciousness and a new set of cultural values and ordering society for a "better life" were significant themes for these writers. However, both the forms of education and the conception of "the good life" were distinctly different in each author's work. The notion of education ranged from a behaviorist approach to a tracked system of philosophy, crafts and militarism, to a notion of individual self- expression and creativity. On the other hand, the vision of "the good life" ranged from theories of social justice, equality, liberty, to notions of individual freedom, creativity, imagination and communal living arrangements. Important to all these theorists was clarifying the relationship between schooling and social change. This concern with the relationship between social theory, social change and education was not only characteristic of utopian philosophers or social theorists like Rousseau and Proudhon, but was also characteristic of American educational philosophers such as John Dewey and George Counts. Here the debate was somewhat different and the concern was not over the ways in which education would act in the new society, but rather the role education would play in the process of social transformation. The focus was on public education, while the questions related to whether the school would become the leader in the process of moving society toward revolution. For John Dewey, schooling in its replication of democratic principles of equality, social justice and community, would extend the notion of political democracy to a cultural and social level. The process of social change would be 3 2 gradual. On the other hand, George Counts, writing in the late twenties under somewhat different circumstances in Dare the Schools Build a New Social Order, suggested the schools become directly involved and play a leadership role in the struggle to fundamentally alter economic and political relationships. The relationship between ways of educating the young and the role education would play in transforming society was a historical and theoretical problem that remained unsolved. Both radicals and liberals provided a different set of analyses and different solutions. For liberal reformers like John Dewey, Jane Addams, Charles Elliott, schooling and education served to correct the inequalities within the present society and to alter attitudes and ways of viewing the world so that a more democratic and freer social order emerged.