Virginia Schools in the Great Depression

How did the Depression challenge teachers to devise new ways of teaching civic participation, and how did civics lessons promote new definitions of democracy, equality, and engagement?

From Aristotle through to the present day an ever-present goal of schooling remains the creation of responsible, thoughtful, informed and caring citizens, who are capable of recognizing the importance of working toward the common good and development of a civilized society. The tumultuous pace of change in the opening decades of the twentieth century, including the effects of industrialization, the impact of the Great War (1914-1918), and the stock market collapse in 1929, led many to question and critique the nature of preparing young people for citizenship in modern society. The Great Depression brought financial ruin to thousands and highlighted the weaknesses of the nation's economic, political and social systems.

Virginia's superintendent of schools, Sidney Hall argued, at the time, that the combined effects of drought and the Depression threatened the progress already made to educate Virginia's young people for democratic citizenry: "Today all that has been won stands in peril. Public education is our first and our last line of national defense. If we have to economize to the extent of breaking down the basic foundations of Virginia's democracy, then we have no-one to blame but those who are responsible for it."

Educators across the United State reiterated the important role and obligations schools had for educating future citizens. They argued that it was the schools responsibility to discover and define the ideals of American society. Given the economic failures of the Great Depression, many educators argued for a renewed focus and thorough examination as to how schools and teachers should educate young citizens to succeed in modern society. How children were to be taught and educated for citizenship would have to undergo a great deal of revision to provide future citizens the tools necessary to prevent the type of turmoil associated with events such as the Great War and the Great Depression.

In response to these conditions and perceptions, Virginia became one of the first states to heed the call for educational change. Beginning in 1931, the state began a process of curriculum revision that was designed to improve the instruction for all children. The statewide program entitled the Virginia Curriculum Program was designed to break with traditional subject specific teaching and instead focus on children's interests as a way to educate them to overcome modern day problems and issues. School subjects were to be merged together under a broad social studies framework. The Virginia Curriculum Program was presented as an evolving curriculum revision. An initial series of curriculum frameworks were prepared and sent to elementary and high schools in 1934. While the Virginia Curriculum Program itself would last until the 1940's, it was during the decade of the Great Depression that Virginia educators engaged most directly in debate about the purposes of education and methods appropriate for teaching future citizens to live the "good life" in a democracy. Both the Virginia Journal of Education, published by the all-white Virginia Education Association, and the Virginia State Bulletin, published by the African-American Virginia Teachers Association, became forums to discuss the purpose and nature of education for citizenship in a changing world and how teachers could best teach about democracy.

The source evidence in this module, pulled from both journals, are designed to allow students to explore the question: How did the Depression challenge teachers to devise new ways of teaching civic participation, and how did civics lessons promote new definitions of democracy, equality, and engagement? What needs to be remembered in working through these sources is that they come from a different context. As the sources illuminate, Virginia schools in this era were segregated by race, yet both black and white school teachers were expected to teach citizenship and democracy as part of the new curriculum program. There is indeed an irony in reading articles by African American Educators as they celebrate and report on the notion of educating for citizenship for the common good at a time when they were viewed by many whites in Virginia as an inferior and unequal minority. The sources within clearly illuminate just how important the notion of citizenship was for both African American and White educators as they struggled to answer such questions as:

1. What kind of citizen should the schools try to develop?
2. Shall individuals be trained to conform to traditional citizenship patterns?
3. Shall they be trained to accept and to adjust to present day social, economic, and moral living?
4. Shall they be trained to criticise, question, and improve past and present methods of social and economic readjustments?
5. What kinds of instructional materials are needed for the development of the ideal citizen?

Teaching for citizenship and democracy is still considered vital today. This module thus allows students to develop and compare their own understandings of citizenship, democracy, and equality with how these concepts were constructed and taught in the past.