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.

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New, softer courses replaced the former college preparatory classes, and students signed up for whatever they wished to study. The interesting result was a near-duplication of the old tracking system because the better students rushed to register for classes with the best, more traditional teachers. Adult authority was widely questioned, and there were several lawsuits against teachers during this time period. There was a collapse of adult authority as a standard for children, and adults seemed to fall back on a strictly legal, technical view of the responsibilities. The school had, more or less, become a social service center in which a variety of specialists served the students. There were free breakfast programs, sex education, drug counseling, suicide prevention, medical advice, counseling for pregnant teenagers, and child care for children of the students (Grant, 1988, p. 66). It is said that when two dogs got loose in the school, a faculty member quipped, "Don't let in any more or we will have to start a program for them." Loitering students and litter filled the halls. One member of the school board found that his daughter had cut 85 classes during one term at Hamilton, and he had not been notified (Grant, 1988, p.

Category: Psychology - A