In the late years of the nineteenth century Barnard and Teachers College were formally incorporated as part of Columbia University. The addition of Barnard and Teachers College to the Columbia system figured within a broad plan to revitalize and transform Columbia from a small, provincial college into a prominent “metropolitan university.” The trend in higher education in the post-Civil War years was toward the development of the modern university; and Columbia rapidly moved in that direction under the leadership of Seth Low, who was president of the university from 1890 to 1901, and later under Nicholas Murray Butler, whose administration spanned the years 1901–45. By the early years of the twentieth century, Columbia had become a complex institution, supporting graduate research, professional education, specialized studies in the arts and sciences, and claiming under its auspices a number of affiliated colleges, and educational and cultural agencies.

As the twentieth century opened, many corporate leaders viewed with dismay the failure of manual training and trade schools to supply an army of skilled workers. Business people especially disliked industrial education programs offered through public school systems, and targeted trade unions and educators alike for criticism. Thomas E. Donnelley of R. R. Donnelley and Sons in Chicago, for example, charged that labor unions gained “representation upon the board of managers (of public schools) for the avowed purpose of seeing that their own monopolistic advantages are not jeopardized.” The chief educational spokesman for the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) characterized public education as “an incapable, semi-ignorant, headless jumble.” The problem, he claimed, stemmed from the training of “the schoolmaster… [who was] uninformed in the needs and direction of the School of Life.”

This forum on the nature of American Education in the twentieth century revolves around the major themes in Paula S. Fass's Outside In: Minorities and the Transformation of American Education (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989). Because of the diverse subjects explored and analyzed in Outside In, the editors of the HEQ invited three leading scholars to respond to the volume, and Professor Pass also kindly agreed to reply to their commentaries. We are extremely grateful to Professors V. P. Franklin of Drexel University; Lynn D. Gordon of the University of Rochester; Maxine Schwartz Seller of the University at Buffalo, State University of New York; and, of course, Paula S. Fass of the University of California at Berkeley, for their willingness to share their perspectives on a broad range of issues with our readers.

Author's note: This essay, intended to commemorate the thirtieth anniversary of the publication of Transformation of the School (New York, 1961), was nearly complete when news came of Lawrence Cremin's sudden, tragic death in early September 1990. I had written it in the present tense, as though Cremin were alive, and for that matter, as though Transformation represented his current views. I can see no good reason for changing it. For many—perhaps most—historians of education, Lawrence Cremin will continue to represent a vital intellectual force for years to come. I prefer to let this review stand in its original form as a tribute to the enduring quality of his contributions to our field.