The Roots of Educational Inequality:Germantown High School, 1907-2011

Erika M. Kitzmiller

Dr. Anne Mullikin, University of Pennsylvania ‘22

GGermantown High School, Faculty 1922-1959

February 2007

Germantown High School, 2007

The Roots of Educational Inequality

• Examines the political, social, and economic factors that contributed to the school’s transformation.

• Analyzes daily events rather than key turning points.

• Examines how inequalities were produced and how individuals challenged and resisted them.

Chapter 1:

Campaigning for a Public High School in the Suburban Sanctuary, 1907 - 1914

Chapter 2:

Legitimizing the New High School in an Increasingly Fractured Community, 1914 - 1928

Chapter 3:

The Foundation Begins to Crack, 1929-1937

Chapter 4:

The Rhetoric of Wartime Unity Masks Inequality, 1938 - 1945

Chapter 5:

Meeting the Needs of a “Modern Generation Living in a Modern Age,”1946 - 1957

Chapter 6:

Urban Renewal and Racial Unrest, 1958 - 1967

Findings

• White flight, alone, did not lead to the school’s transformation.

• Philadelphia never allocated enough funding for its schools.

• Private funding for public schools and charitable organizations.

• Educational institutions were sites that both replicated and undermined structural inequalities.

Conclusion

14