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Analysis of an American High School

Gerald Grant's book, The World We Created at Hamilton High, clearly shows the dilemmas of public schools today. His description of what happened to an American high school during several decades of optimism, integration, and rebellion serves as a microcosm of education in the larger society. Grant squarely places the issues of the last thirty-five years before the reader and presents a case history of a school that attempted the American dream--a fair education for everyone. It is the purpose of this paper to analyze the book, covering the major historical, political, legal, and social influences on Hamilton High and the general influences on education in the United States over the past thirty or forty years.

The book was a result of Grant's interest in what makes a good school. As an outgrowth of several small studies in thirty-five schools he focused on writing a sociologically informed history of Hamilton High. The history is not long, as the school was established in 1953, but long enough to provide a critical perspective of the changing forces within and without the field of education as shown in one school (Grant, 1988, p. 5). He chose Hamilton high, not because it is a typical school, but because it is closer to an ideal school. It is a racially, ethnically, and economically integrated public school that serves a number of disabled students in the regular classroom. It represents America in a microcosm.

Hamilton High was established in the beautiful hills of the newly developed upper middle class east side of the city of Median, a smaller Pittsburgh with a population of about 220,000. Hamilton's students were primarily the children of professionals, managers, and faculty of the local university. Early 1950s photographs of the students show the carefully coiffed girls in sweaters, skirts, and pearls smiling at boys in crew cuts and baggy khakis (Grant, 1988, p. 13). High school students at this time were refer...

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Analysis of an American High School. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 20:09, March 28, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1692745.html